The Bloomington Ice Garden in Bloomington, Minnesota, has reopened after roughly 200 days of construction, unveiling a $37 million renovation that city leaders say modernizes the beloved arena while preserving its history.

"I couldn't be more excited than to be here, the Bloomington Ice Garden, opening up this Saturday with our grand opening," Bloomington Mayor Tim Busse said on Monday. "You can see there's already folks on the ice. Just thrilled that we're back in here after only 200 days closed between closure and reopening. And the amount of work we did here was amazing."

The project is funded through the city's half-cent local option sales tax as part of the Bloomington Forward plan. Busse said the 1970s-era building needed both mechanical upgrades and a better fan experience.

"We knew the building was open in 1970. It was tired. It needed some work done ... not only the nuts and bolts kind of mechanical stuff, a new roof, new ice-making equipment and so on. We just needed to improve the user and visitor experience in this building, and to bring it up to the iconic status that it is," Busse said.

A key change is that the main sheet was resized from Olympic to NHL dimensions, bringing all three sheets to standard size for games and tournaments.

"Practically speaking, it made more sense to shrink it down to an NHL-sized rink, and now we have three sheets of ice standard-sized, and we can use them for different tournaments," Busse said. 

The renovation also adds seating and improves viewing sightlines.

"There's plenty of room in here for fans. Now, in fact, we fully expect to host more tournaments, more section finals for the state hockey tournament, just, it's a better fan experience on a number of different levels," Busse said.

Chad Nyberg, activities director at Bloomington Jefferson High School, said the upgrades help players and keep the building's character intact.

"From a high school perspective, having rink one, which was our old rink three, downsized to an NHL-size rink is tremendous, seating on both sides that will help us get good visual angles," Nyberg said. "And from a high school player perspective, having locker rooms underneath the stands is, is a huge plus, not having to drag your bag around and things like that."

"I think there's, again, when I was walking around, like you could still feel some of the old right on top of the new, or the new on top of the old, and still have that sense of nostalgia for sure," Nyberg added. "But it's going to feel different in its own way, and it's going to create new memories for people."

This season also marks a new chapter for high school hockey in the city, with the Bloomington Kennedy and Bloomington Jefferson Hockey programs skating together.

"It's great to see that the two schools came together and found a solution to the dwindling number of players over at Kennedy," Busse said. "I'm so very glad that they're going to be part of the Jefferson program now, and we can continue that great tradition of great high school hockey in Bloomington."

Locals know the rink by a simple nickname.

"Of course, this is Bloomington Ice Garden, but everybody in town calls it BIG, and that's all you have to say," Busse said. "And everybody knows what you're talking about."