The British Columbia Lottery Corporation (BCLC) continues to upgrade its in-person sports betting at casinos across the province with new PROLINE sportsbooks.
BCLC opened its fifth retail sportsbook in 2025 on Sept. 21 at Chances Casino Fort St. John, the first of its kind outside the southern band of the province.
The retail sportsbook features a custom-built space with a 24-foot screen, allowing players to watch multiple matches simultaneously, as well as six self-serve PROLINE betting terminals, enabling players to place pre-game and live bets, including single bets and parlays.
A grand opening event was held on Sunday with a showing of the Kansas City Chiefs‘ win over the New York Giants in NFL Sunday Night Football. Customers were given a chance to play for more than $10,000 in prizes, including a Vancouver gameday package consisting of round-trip flights from Fort St. John to Vancouver, a hotel and two tickets to the Vancouver Canucks vs. Edmonton Oilers NHL game at Rogers Arena on Jan. 17, 2026, plus $1,500 in gift cards.
“We are thrilled to open our newest PROLINE Sportsbook Lounge at Chances Casino Fort St. John,” said BCLC’s COO Dan Beebe before the event. “With wall-to-wall displays and a modern sportsbook offering, we believe that the lounge will provide an exciting and memorable experience for both sports fans and bettors alike in Fort St. John and around the Peace River region.”
Reaching out across BC
Image: BCLC
The new sportsbook is BCLC’s fifth retail sportsbook in B.C. It opened the first pair at Vancouver’s Parq Casino and Chances Casino Kelowna in February around the time of the Super Bowl, and added locations at Chances Maple Ridge in May and Casino of the Rockies in June. The Fort St. John is its second location near the Alberta border, after Casino of the Rockies in Cranbrook.
A sixth PROLINE book is expected to open soon at Chances Terrace in west central B.C.
The lounges are destination showcases for BCLC’s expanded and revamped PROLINE sportsbook, which it unveiled last fall on the eve of the NFL season to replace the Sports Action sportsbook that shut down in May 2024 after 33 years.
In an interview with Canadian Gaming Business last year, BCLC’s Manager of Retail Sports Brett Hanson detailed PROLINE’s new and expanded features, which include a move to fully digital bet slips, an exponential increase in bet types and range and a variety of betting markets on local teams.
A destination experience at home
And Senior Manager of Sports Aaron Myette told June’s Canadian Gaming Business magazine that the retail sportsbooks are a key component of the in-person gaming experience BCLC wants to offer people in B.C. and from far beyond.
“Our players are province-wide, so we want to start creating experiences where they are at,” Myette told us. “The sportsbook lounges aren’t limited to sports. What can we do for our fans? What’s the experience we can create? That, to me, is not only a unique advantage but the next step for really giving added value to our players. It’s about creating those destinations here. People from the States, from elsewhere in Canada, even from other parts of B.C., are coming to Vancouver for that destination experience.
“If we can create that mindset that you don’t need to cross a border or an ocean for a destination, that’s what it’s all about. We want our B.C. players to know they can find a world-class gambling experience in their own backyard.”
