If you've seen the flyers for "912 Community Day" at Anchor Park, you already know the date. Free admission, ribbon cuttings at both new buildings, live music, food trucks, a bounce house or two. What the flyer doesn't tell you is that the ribbon you're watching get cut on September 12 doesn't actually open the rink for regular use. The Learn to Skate classes, the ones most families are waiting for, don't start until October 3, three weeks later.
That gap matters if you're planning a weekend around this place, and it says something worth knowing about how this whole project has gone from the start: the announced date and the usable date have rarely been the same thing at Anchor Park.
Two Openings, Three Weeks Apart
The Sunset Jazz Festival on August 2 was technically the first ticketed event at Anchor Park, held inside the VyStar Pavilion before construction on the rest of the site was finished. Mayor Tracy Saunders called it the start of "a brand new future for the city" that night, and the 5,200-seat amphitheater has been the more or less finished half of the property since then.
The Ghost Pirates Ice Cove is the half that's still catching up. September 12's ribbon cutting is a community celebration, with public skating available "while capacity allows" according to the event listing, but it's not the same as a standing public skate schedule. That schedule, along with the first Learn to Skate USA sessions and the youth "Little Ghost Pirates" hockey program, is set to begin October 3. If you're bringing kids for lessons rather than a one-off skate, that's the date to circle, not the ribbon cutting.
How a $30 Million Rink Ended Up in a Highway Town
The Ice Cove has been years in the making, and the numbers attached to it have moved more than once. The Savannah Ghost Pirates and the City of Port Wentworth first agreed to build a dedicated practice facility back in April 2023. Construction broke ground in August 2024, and the press materials from that groundbreaking already flagged two changes from the original plan: the cost had climbed from $25 million to $30 million, and the completion date had slipped from summer 2025 to the first quarter of 2026. The final structural beam didn't go up until October 2025, and the building wasn't actually finished until well into 2026, closer to a year behind that first public estimate.
The facility itself is a 90,000 square foot building with two regulation ice sheets, built by Zawyer Sports, the Ghost Pirates' parent company, as the team's official practice home. It sits inside the 150-acre Anchor Park, where the Port Wentworth Development Authority owns the property and buildings and has signed a 25-year lease with the Ghost Pirates. Day-to-day operations fall to Oak View Group, a Denver-based venue management company. Combined with the amphitheater, restaurant, and club seating, the two buildings add roughly 145,800 square feet of brand-new sports and entertainment space to a city that, as Saunders put it the night the pavilion opened:
"We are not just a drive-through town anymore."
That's not a throwaway line. Port Wentworth sits on I-95 between Savannah and the South Carolina line, and for most of its history that's exactly what it's been known for: a place you pass through, not a place you plan a Saturday around.
What's Actually Ready Right Now
Here's where things stand as of this month, separated from what's still coming:
- VyStar Pavilion has been hosting ticketed shows since August 2, including the Sunset Jazz Festival, and the amphitheater's ongoing concert calendar is the most fully operational piece of the site.
- Ghost Pirates Ice Cove opens to the public September 12 for the ribbon-cutting celebration, with skating available as capacity allows, but its structured public schedule and group and private lesson options begin October 3.
- Learn to Skate USA classes and the Little Ghost Pirates youth hockey program both launch October 3, built around the same curriculum US Figure Skating uses nationally, with group, private, and semi-private tracks.
- The surrounding multi-use fields, including space earmarked for pickleball, soccer, softball, and baseball across the 150-acre park, were part of the original plan but weren't part of the September opening announcements, so treat those as still in progress rather than ready for a weekend game.
If you're the type to check a calendar before driving out, that's the honest state of the property this month. The buildings are open. The full slate of programming isn't, quite yet.
Why This Actually Changes the Map
Before this year, there wasn't a public ice rink anywhere in the Savannah area. If your kid wanted to try hockey or figure skating, or you just wanted an air-conditioned Saturday activity in July, that meant a drive well outside the region. Anchor Park changes that math for anyone in Port Wentworth, Pooler, Savannah proper, or Rincon, all of which sit within a short drive of the site.
It's also worth keeping straight from something else happening the same month. The Savannah Jazz Festival, the city's long-running free festival at Forsyth Park, runs September 18 through 20 this year with headliners including Jane Monheit and the Savannah Jazz Orchestra. That's a separate event from the Sunset Jazz Festival that opened VyStar Pavilion back in August. Different city, different stage, same month, easy to mix up if you're skimming a calendar.
For residents who've watched Port Wentworth mostly as the town you pass on the way to the airport or the outlet malls, Anchor Park is the first real reason to get off at that exit on purpose. The rink alone gives the region something it didn't have. The timeline it took to get there, and the gap between the ribbon cutting and the day you can actually book a skate lesson, is the kind of detail you only catch if you're paying attention to how these things actually unfold locally, not just reading the press release.
If you're weighing what life looks like on this side of the Savannah area, from Pooler out toward Port Wentworth, the neighborhood texture matters as much as the square footage. Homes by TLC spends its days in these neighborhoods, not just its listings, and we're always glad to talk through what a specific street, school run, or Saturday morning actually looks like before you make a move. Reach out anytime you want a local read that goes beyond the flyer.
