Detroit in funk without game

DETROIT - There's a hole in the heart of Hockeytown.

Joe Louis Arena was dark and empty New Year's Eve. It's the place where thousands traditionally begin their night of revelry with a pre-holiday Detroit Red Wings game.

And with no sign of progress toward a deal to end the NHL lockout, fans and the sports bars and other businesses that serve them are left remembering the excitement of seasons past and hoping for a future with pro hockey in it.

"You can't sit there and cry. There'll be hockey next year," said Nemo's Bar co-owner Tim Springstead. "The outlook for this year? There is no outlook."

Pro sports have been a bright spot in a sometimes bleak city, where a shrinking and increasingly impoverished population of 911,000 people is surrounded by a ring of more affluent suburbs in a metropolitan area of 4.5 million.

Detroit's downtown has seen a marked economic revival the past few years, sparked in part by the opening of state-of-the-art venues for baseball's Detroit Tigers (Comerica Park, 2000) and the NFL's Detroit Lions (Ford Field, 2002).

The opening of new corporate headquarters (General Motors Corp. in 1996 and Compuware Corp. in 2003), casinos, stores, theaters and restaurants have helped inject new life as well.

But even when times were bad, life pulsed at the perpetually sold-out Joe Louis Arena, home ice for the winner of three of the past eight Stanley Cup championships. If there were hockey this season, the Red Wings would have been home Friday against the Vancouver Canucks.

In 1982, the new owner of Andrews on the Corner got the idea to run game-night shuttle buses from his bar to the arena. The 1-mile service drew 200 to 250 riders on an average game night, peaking at 500 during the championships, said owner Tom Woolsey. He runs similar service to Lions games.

With no games, many fans have turned to the sport of labor relations, following the on-and-off contract talks between owners seeking "cost certainty" and the NHL Players Association determined to resist. No new talks have been scheduled since bargainers last met Dec. 14. The NHL board of governors plans to meet Jan. 14.

Those with an urge to see the ice on New Year's Eve had another option - lace up their own skates, said Carolyn Artman of the Detroit Metro Convention & Visitors Bureau. The newly opened outdoor rink at downtown Campus Martius was open until midnight.

"It's skating, even if it's not hockey," Artman said.