New cycling facility planned for Delancey Park

Tuesday 10 January 2023

Cycling facilities at Delancey Park will be enhanced with a new pump track, if planners back the scheme.

The Guernsey Velo Club’s application will transform the dilapidated tennis courts into an innovative feature which would bolster the cycling offering at the park which has been described as the club’s spiritual home.

A pump track is a continuous circuit of banked turns interspaced by rollers and other features that can be ridden without pedalling.

It will allow the club to coach bike handling skills in a safe environment and also be accessible to the public to use for free.

Pictured: An indicative layout for the proposed pump track.

“Delancey Park has always been a cycling hub of the Island,” said cycling development officer Paul De Garis.

“You’ve already got the 660m road track here and with the increase in mountain biking in the island, now cyclocross as well, this will just bring another element. It is an area we can use as a coaching facility as well for the kids and adults.”

The preferred option is for the track to be asphalt, which will help reduce maintenance costs, with grass inbetween to help drainage.

It will have no artificial lighting and planting will be used to reduce its impact on properties to the north and east.

Gathering areas will be created on the south and west sides, away from housing.

A pump track has been on the club’s radar for some time, but the lockdown periods delayed progress on the project.

Pictured: The tennis courts at Delancey Park.

“It will just make the area so much better,” said Mr De Garis.

“You look at it now and you have kids that come in and drop off and ride around, but it's slippery. It's not nice. The pump track will be easy on the eye. Right now it's not a tennis court, it's not a netball court. It's nothing. I think that the pump track will just give added value to what's already up here and hopefully promote cycling in general.”

With more homes being built in the area, it is hoped this community facility will be another area that families can use to stay active.

The Guernsey Velo Club has long standing links to Delancey.

In the late 1990s it raised funds to build the tarmac track which allow it to form its youth section, the Delancey Flyers.

Now on Wednesday nights during the summer, more than 140 children are part of that programme. Adult criterium and mountain bike racing also takes place there.

The club is looking for sponsors to support the latest project.