Guernsey Velo Club’s plans to build a pump track at Delancey Park are progressing with a third of the budget secured so far.
A pump track is a purpose built track for cycling, with rollers, banked turns and features designed to be ridden completely by riders generating momentum by up and down body movements rather than pedalling.
Planning permission is in place for the facility to be built where the redundant tennis courts are at the park.
The new facility is being designed for the community to use.
“In terms of fundraising, we’ve got a couple of grant applications in at the moment, so fingers crossed, we’re going to be successful at those,” said Velo Club’s Mark Smith.
“Fundraising activity will ramp up over the summer. We’ve got a base amount of money which we need to have guaranteed so that we can get spades in the ground. But it’s hoped we can start this summer. If not, it will have to be next summer.”
He said it was an exciting community project.
“Anybody will be able to go up there and ride the pump track. Delancey Park is a fab location for it and it will add a little bit of life into the social part of what happens at Delancey. The plans we’ve got for the track itself are actually at the top of what we would expect a pump track to be.”
Many small towns across France have pump tracks.
It will be free to use, said Mr Smith.
“It’s going to be built so that you can ride pretty much any sort of bike or scooter on it, nothing motorized.
“I’ve seen people on cyclocross bikes, riding them on mountain bikes, BMXs, balance bikes. So it’d be really, really nice to have a angel sponsor just to step in.”
There is more information about the project on gvc.gg.
Anyone interested in finding out more and sponsoring the project can email pumptrack@gvc.gg or president@gvc.gg.