Warmerpeg? River skating trail at The Forks closes after shortest season ever

The Forks river trail in Winnipeg is shown earlier this month, between the two short stretches when it was open for skating.

Winnipeg’s winter is just too warm.

The Forks river trail is closed for the season after just nine full days of operation.

It was the shortest season — both in distance and time — for Winnipeg’s well-loved skating trail, if you don’t count 2020, when the trail didn’t open at all, The Forks said in a Wednesday news release.

The Nestaweya River Trail, which in the past has been open as long as 76 days (in 2019) and stretched as far as 10 kilometres (in 2018), was only open for nine full days, between the Jan. 25-30 and Feb. 13-17 periods, this winter.

The trail was just 600 metres long, from the port rink at The Forks over to a short section on the Red River. The previous shortest trail was six kilometres, which was the trail’s length for several years.

This year, extremely mild temperatures, precipitation that flowed up from the south, and inconsistent melts and freezes kept the trail from being open longer, The Forks said in its news release.

The trail didn’t open in 2020 after the water level dropped underneath the ice cover and frazil ice formed, making a skating trail a dangerous proposition.

This year also brought the latest opening and the earliest closure of the skating trail.

The previous shortest season was 33 days in 2017, when the river trail closed on Feb. 18.

The previous latest opening was Jan. 21, in 2016 — but that year it stayed open until March 5.

The Forks is no longer monitoring or maintaining the ice and advises people to stay off the rivers.

Weather permitting, on-land skating trails will still be open at The Forks.