New facilities, revived sports, sustainability benchmarks and community buy-in ensure the 2025 Canada Games have lasting impact.
By Allan Lynch
Fast facts: 2025 Canada Games
- August 8–25, 2025
- 5,000 athletes, coaches, managers and technical officials
- 5,000 registered volunteers
- 25 capital projects
Hosting the 30th edition of the Canada Games in St. John’s, NL, was a long journey in several senses. Clinging to the edge of North America, St. John’s isn’t a place you drop in on your way to somewhere else. It is a purposeful destination.
According to Karen Sherriffs, CEO of the 2025 Canada Games Host Society, “It’s a long journey” from the 2020 bid process to the 2025 Games. “The excitement was significant” as St. John’s prepared to host the country.
“We heard lots of people saying ‘Newfoundland and Labrador is on our bucket list to see’ and they sure showed up to support the athletes,” Sherriffs says. “I think each athlete came with a minimum of three people to watch, support and cheer them on.”
Hosting the Games in August in the height of tourist season required substantial buy-in from the city and surrounding communities of Conception Bay South, Paradise, Mount Pearl, Logy Bay, Middle Cove and Ladder Cove.
Kelly-Ann Paul, president and CEO of the Canada Games Council, says, “St. John’s…one of Canada’s smallest provinces and smallest capital cities, hosted the most participants we have ever seen in Canada Games history.”
THE LOGISTICS
The St. John’s Games were a logistical challenge. These were the first Canada Games where participants from all 12 provinces and territories had to fly in.
Paul explains, “The Canada Games turnaround day is probably the largest logistics movement in the country. We moved 5,000 people in and out of an airport in a 24-hour window. It’s a massive undertaking.” Sherriffs adds that August 17, 2025 “was the busiest day in the history of the St. John’s airport.”
ATPI Travel and Events Canada was hired to handle travel. They launched a national RFP to hire charter planes and figure out which commercial airlines would be willing to free up space. They also stepped in to help when, in the midst of the Games, Air Canada staff went on strike, affecting 300 support staff and two provincial teams.
WILDFIRES
Wildfires were another challenge for organizers. Newfoundland, like several provinces, suffered massive wildfires in 2025. One, across Conception Bay from the Avalon Peninsula where St. John’s is located, consumed 10,708 hectares. This impacted about 500 volunteers who were either evacuated from their homes or involved in fighting fires.
Paul says climate change impacts and natural disasters are not a new element for Canada Games Council consideration: “Comprehensive risk management is a standard for operations of the Canada Games. Host societies are required to develop and adhere to a risk policy, which requires a comprehensive registry and review process, and routine reports to key partners. Climate change impacts on the Canada Games, including wildfires, flooding and lack of snow, require host societies to plan for contingency venues and adaptation processes. As each edition passes, the movement learns from the previous, and processes are improved and adapted to the risk level of the host community.”
GAME CHANGERS
The 2025 Games revived lacrosse and artistic swimming, and debuted women’s baseball. It’s a bittersweet change, says Paul: “80% of the program is set before we launch the bid because the communities need to know what they’re bidding on and what venues are required. Then we adapt the rest of the program with the host community to whatever is influencing sport in terms of the national or international perspective. Absorbing a new sport is always great, but to do that we usually have to say goodbye to a sport, which is hard.”
LEGACY AND SUSTAINABILITY
While St. John’s benefits from 25 capital projects—including a $34-million Fortis Canada Games Complex and $20-million refurbishment of the Aquarena (built for the 1977 Canada Games)—they also created a sustainability legacy.
Paul says, Racing to Zero—a sustainability consultancy of former athletes—was contracted to measure Scope 1 & 2 emissions, and the University of Toronto developed a comprehensive Scope 3 Emissions Framework and calculations for the 2025 Canada Games.
Sherriffs says, “This is the beginning of how sustainability fits into hosting a major event like the Canada Games. We will be the first Games to build a benchmark of measurement for further Games.”
Published March 2026
