Brendon Rope
On the surface, it sounds kind of cool to have a cycling velodrome in Napier and resonates with the strength of cycling in Hawke's Bay.
Unfortunately, that is where the good idea ends and Napier City Council (NCC) need to wake up to the facts before they create another white elephant that is a drain on the ratepayers. The critical reasons are: Cost, demand, opportunity cost and community benefit.
The capital cost of the build may secure external funding but the ongoing asset renewal costs won't, ie. the bigger the price tag to build, the bigger the renewal expense.
Historically councils have been woeful with renewal planning and financing, particularly with recreational facilities. It is getting better so the assumption will be that if there is a $15,000,000 capital investment to build it then the recommended annual renewal contingency will be something like $600,000. This has not been disclosed in the Long Term Plan (LTP) consultation documentation. If it is within the stated $646,000 pa of operational costs, then the operational costs have been understated.
User pays utilisation is always overstated in feasibility studies. Look at any sports facility around the country. As per the LTP consultation information "who will use it" identifies other sporting codes "could" use the track for training purposes and that the multipurpose surface would accommodate other sports.
There are several issues here: The sporting community do not have a good track record for paying the level of fees required to cover operational costs, let alone renewal costs of sporting facilities.
The number of users at any one time on a cycling track is limited therefore a per-user cost will need to be high to achieve cost recovery or kept low and not achieve cost recovery. If the multi-use surface is achieving capacity usage then there could be hope, but the trade-off will be that the surface will not be appropriate for all sports to the regulation level so will not attract "serious" sport. Utilisation during the off peak time, ie. within school hours, cannot be considered in the business case. If it happens, brilliant, but it cannot be relied on for contributing to revenue. Schools may use it but the fees that make it attractive will not achieve cost recovery.
The demand versus supply equation has to be equitable, ie. there is an international standard velodrome 3 hours up the road that will compete for market share. The primary purpose of the proposed facility is cycling. The demand for track cycling indoors has to be significant and the price per-use attractive. I would suggest that, while cycling is strong in Hawke's Bay and our good weather accommodates this well, a cyclist will be faced with the decision to pay a fee to ride around the track or get out on the road at no cost. Athletes in Hawke's Bay are primarily amateur and therefore have limited discretionary income. In the winter demand will be higher but council has to be certain the demand is there or prepare to fund the operational deficit.
It seems there may have been a shift in thinking regarding the management of the facility by locating it adjacent to Pettigrew.Green Arena and operating under shared management model. Although the argument is that it will improve the ability for the management to make it financially sustainable is flawed.
As outlined above there will require operational funding, the degree of which will not accurately be known until it is built and operating.
From a ratepayer's perspective, the big question needs to be what is the return on investment? NCC will have to be certain that investing in a niche segment within cycling, ie. track cyclists, has the same or greater community benefit as investing in other sporting opportunities. For example, there has been work over the last five years investigating increased indoor wooden court space for basketball, volleyball and futsal (netball can be added in there although it is an outdoor sport moving indoors). There has been some work in the regional provision of aquatic facilities.
How does the velodrome fit into the regional facilities strategy? Would there be a better community returns from investing more in aquatic facilities? Swimming is a life skill after all! Multi-use versus specific use? All questions the council needs to answer before charging off on this tangent.
A cycling velodrome in Hawke's Bay will not be economically sustainable as a sole purpose facility. Therefore, making it multi-purpose may increase the possibility but there are too many variables to confirm that assumption. It will create space allocation decision conflicts for management and tensions between user organisations. There are health and safety risk mitigation considerations on top of the financial ones and there are better investment options for greater community outcomes.
While I applaud the approach to think big about investing in sports facilities, I would recommend looking at the whole picture and test the thinking against the Regional Facilities Strategy. At the end of the day this will not be a case of sell the buses and move on. It will be a legacy for the council and the ratepayers which is more likely to be one we are not proud of.
-Brendon Rope is a long serving sport and recreation professional and former Pettigrew.Green Arena CEO.
-Business and civic leaders, organisers, experts in their field and interest groups can contribute opinions. The views expressed here are the writer's personal opinion, and not the newspaper's. Email: editor@hbtoday.co.nz
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