Bagot Park velodrome canned as Cycling NT gives $10.5 million back to NT Government

THE Bagot Park velodrome upgrades will not go ahead, with Cycling NT to give $10.5 million allocated to the project back to the NT government

The Bagot Park velodrome upgrades will not go ahead, with Cycling NT in the process of returning the $10.5m allocated to the project back to the NT government.

THE Bagot Park velodrome upgrades will not go ahead, with Cycling NT in the process of returning the $10.5m allocated to the project back to the NT government.

The cycling community, which had lobbied initially for $1m that eventually grew to $10.5m, had been working with the Northern Territory government and Darwin council to develop the site, with council taking management of the project.

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Cycling NT chief executive Mark Heath said plans returned from Darwin council didn’t align with Cycling NT’s vision.

“We were hoping it would be built out at Bagot Park, we were hoping the whole park area would be redeveloped, there would be green space, it would include a pump track and a skills track for the kids,” he said.

“What (council) came back with, they said it would be like a community skate park or velodrome, it would be concrete, there’d be no roof, it couldn’t be locked up, there’d be no storage facility and the skills track was going to be a stage-two development.

“In the best interest, that’s not what we lobbied the money for.”

Mr Heath said the cycling community would now likely look outside the Darwin muni­cipality to build a new velodrome.

“I don’t think Bagot Park is on our radar at this stage unless council can offer something that will be successful for us,” he said.

“We’ve asked the government to take back the money so we can work with DIPL (to) find crown land or even land in Palmerston somewhere.”

Cycling NT chairwoman Megan Lawton said it was a disappointing end to a proposal that was five years in the making.

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“Our core business is to grow track and road cycling for the benefit of the whole community to draw people to the NT for road and track cycling and we can’t do that without a purpose-built facility,” she said. “Unfortunately, a glorified skate park was not going to be that venue.

“It’s with a heavy heart because we know the project is going to be delayed further.”

The funding return will go through Darwin council’s confidential sitting at Tuesday’s meeting.