Erie Otters
Rink: Erie Insurance Arena
Capacity: 6,716
Built: 1983
League: OHL
City: Erie, Pennsylvania
Home Of: Erie Otters
Games Attended: 8
First Game: January 2, 2009 vs Brampton
Most Recent Game: December 9, 2023 vs Guelph
Unique Arena: #19
OHL Arena: #15
Another in the list of heavily renovated rinks. Erie used to be old, dank and dark. Now it’s well lit, wide, comfy and state of the art. Nicely done Erie. Being a downtown rink though paying for parking is the norm. I usually pay $5 in a new parking garage across the street from the rink. Next door to is UPMC Park, home of the Erie Seawolves baseball team, who are the AA affiliate of the Detroit Tigers. Since the above exterior picture was taken there has been even further renovations, and now the rink and the ballpark share attached building space which houses the team stores for both the Otters and Seawolves. I would rank the Otters store among the best in the entire OHL.
Once you walk through the doors of the EIA, you find yourself in a nice wide concourse that is filled with all sorts of different concession options and the aforementioned team store(s) sit just off to the right from the main entrances. The bowl in Erie is laid out in a U shape. The bottom of the U is the new addition from 2012 and the seats are actually at a steeper rake here than they are on the sides of the ice. Due to that I find sitting in the corners give the best vantage point in Erie. The sides are a bit too shallow for my liking, and you feel like you’re sitting further back from the ice than you should be.
At the top of the U there are no seats but just a giant wall which has a few extra suites built into it and has an extra scoreboard hanging on it as well as all the team banners. The side seats towards this end all face forward, as opposed to curving in with the corner of the boards, so some of these seats don’t have the best view. Plus another drawback is you can’t walk 360 degrees around the building. The path you see behind the boards in the photo below is not accessible to fans. If you want to see someone over in section 201 you gotta take the long way around.
Erie still remains one of the loudest rinks in the entire CHL as Erie fans can bring the noise even with smaller crowds. When the rink is full it is among the most intimating places you could be as a visiting fan. It seems to be a trend in the CHL that American crowds bring a bit more noise and enthusiasm cheering for their teams, but among the nine US based franchises in the CHL I would put Erie’s fans up against any of them.
Above I have included a photo from my first trip to the then-named Tullio Arena in January 2009. This end of the building had a small amount of seating, but in 2012 everything behind the end boards was torn down and for a whole season the Otters played with a giant blue tarp behind the glass from floor to ceiling as the renovations took place behind it.
The renovations in Erie turned a dank pit of an arena into a sparkling gem that I now consider easily in the top half of the league. The best part being the atmosphere in Erie didn’t go away either. It’s just as good now as it’s ever been and you should definitely go see it for yourself.
