{"id":892078,"date":"2026-09-11T18:46:16","date_gmt":"2026-09-11T18:46:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/892078\/"},"modified":"2026-09-11T18:46:16","modified_gmt":"2026-09-11T18:46:16","slug":"demolition-begins-ahead-of-proposed-surrey-arena-and-entertainment-district-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/892078\/","title":{"rendered":"Demolition begins ahead of proposed Surrey Arena and Entertainment District"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Demolition has begun at an old grocery store building at King George Boulevard and 104th Avenue in Surrey, to make way for a proposed 10,000-seat arena and the development of Surrey\u2019s entertainment district.<\/p>\n<p>Mayor Brenda Locke was first to start the demolition, and with the municipal election just a few weeks away, Locke quickly traded in her hardhat for a campaign hat.<\/p>\n<p><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" data-id=\"4481987\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/vlcsnap-2026-09-10-18h09m45s748-1024x576.png\" alt=\"Surrey Mayor Brenda Locke at the site of the demolition of a grocery store to begin the construction of a new arena. \" class=\"wp-image-4481987\"  \/>Surrey Mayor Brenda Locke at the site of the demolition of a grocery store to begin the construction of a new arena. (CityNews Image)<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s going to be a place where young people and old people and everybody in between not only play sports but enjoy amazing concerts,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSo many amazing things are going to happen right here in Surrey.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Locke, who\u2019s running for reelection in the fall, is touting the project as a major economic investment over the next decade, while critics say the project has more questions than answers.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" data-id=\"4481993\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/vlcsnap-2026-09-10-18h08m01s161-1024x576.png\" alt=\"Demolition has begun at an old grocery store building at King George Boulevard and 104th Avenue in Surrey, to make way for a proposed 10,000-seat arena and the development of Surrey's entertainment district.\" class=\"wp-image-4481993\"  \/>(CityNews Image)<\/p>\n<p>Coun. Linda Annis, who is also running for mayor, says she expects the total price tag to reach nearly double the original $360 million estimate.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cTaxpayers can\u2019t be on the hook for this,\u201d Annis said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s really troublesome when families can\u2019t get their kids into swimming lessons because we don\u2019t have enough pools, yet we\u2019re building something like this that\u2019s going to be cost-prohibitive, again on the backs of taxpayers.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" data-id=\"4481988\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/vlcsnap-2026-09-10-18h08m22s045-1024x576.png\" alt=\"Surrey Coun. Linda Annis. \" class=\"wp-image-4481988\"  \/>Surrey Coun. Linda Annis. (CityNews Image)<\/p>\n<p>Locke says even if she isn\u2019t elected mayor this fall, the project is already full steam ahead.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m very confident in the work we\u2019ve done to date, because Surrey is very aggressive in our timelines,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" data-id=\"4481992\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/vlcsnap-2026-09-10-18h04m50s921-1024x576.png\" alt=\"(CityNews Image)\" class=\"wp-image-4481992\"  \/>(CityNews Image)<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" data-id=\"4481990\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/vlcsnap-2026-09-10-18h09m18s491-1024x576.png\" alt=\"(CityNews Image)\" class=\"wp-image-4481990\"  \/>(CityNews Image)<\/p>\n<p>The proposed arena is set to become the next home of the Western Hockey League\u2019s Vancouver Giants. In attendance were members of the team as well as part owner and popular local musician Michael Bubl\u00e9.<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t<img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/vlcsnap-2026-09-10-18h04m34s792-1024x576.png\" class=\"attachment-large size-large wp-post-image\" alt=\"\" ratio=\"16x9\" decoding=\"async\"  \/>\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\tDemolition has begun at an old grocery store building at King George Boulevard and 104th Avenue in Surrey, to make way for a proposed 10,000-seat arena and the development of Surrey&#8217;s entertainment district. (CityNews Image) <\/p>\n<p>\t\tKeep it Factual<\/p>\n<p>Add CityNews Vancouver as a trusted source on Google to see more local stories from us.<\/p>\n<p>\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/preferences\/source?q=vancouver.citynews.ca\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><br \/>\n\t\t<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"add-trusted-source-badge\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/1789152376_639_google-trusted-badge.png\" alt=\"Add as a preferred source on Google\" width=\"198\" height=\"63\"\/><br \/>\n\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Demolition has begun at an old grocery store building at King George Boulevard and 104th Avenue in Surrey,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":892079,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194299],"tags":[49,48,87674],"class_list":["post-892078","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-surrey","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-surrey"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/892078","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=892078"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/892078\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/892079"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=892078"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=892078"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=892078"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}