For a lot of people a bike skills facility has been high on the list of needed amenities in the Royal City, and it’s been on the back burner for a long time. Perhaps a new staff report to council will give all those people some hope to get something more immediate going as the report lays out, in some very specific detail, what the potential facility in Eastview Park might look like in 2028 or (hopefully) before.

So what is a bike skills facility? Think of it as an obstacle course for you and your bike, a kind of cousin to the skatepark in Silvercreek Park with courses and tracks that will suit any bicyclist’s skill level. “A bicycle skills facility in Eastview Park would be the first City-maintained formal bicycle skills facility in Guelph. The design concept will create a new recreational asset for cyclists and will also provide opportunities for skateboard and scooter use,” the report said.

Diagrams included in the report show that the bike skills facility will make up a big portion of the Eastview Park, which itself is still not yet fully developed, and will feature trails for beginners, intermediate riders, advanced riders and experts. It will also feature lines, jumps, and pump tracks for all those skill levels as well, and all for a budget of $416,000 with construction currently scheduled in the 10-year capital planning for sometime in 2028.

Construction of the park will also talk place in two phases so that staff can monitor the success of the first phase, and make adjustments to the plan as needed before construction starts on the second phase.

Check out the proposed maps for the project below:

The plan for the bike skills facility comes in-part from consultation done by the City of Guelph last summer, where 214 people took part and 94 per cent of them saying that they were interested in the development of the facility. Interestingly, feedback was split about the direction of the skills facility with people split evenly between kids 5 to 12, teens 12 to 18, young adults 18 to 25, and 25 years and up. Feedback was also split between whether the park should be intended for beginner, intermediate, or advanced cyclists.

The plan for the Bicycle Skills Facility Conceptual Development Project was put together with $50,000 from the Development Charges supported capital project budget.

The Silvercreek Skatepark opened in June 2016 after years and years of development and planning at the City. It cost almost $900,000 to build and develop.