Friday 28 January 2011

Auckland Council’s decision to back Auckland’s bid to build a world class, national Cycling Centre of Excellence (CCE) and Indoor Velodrome in Waitakere, has been welcomed by Mayor Len Brown.

“Council’s support of this project shows that we are a progressive city and that we are firmly committed to making Auckland a world class destination,” says Len Brown.

While winning the bid will put Auckland on the global high-performance sporting map, building the CCE will also achieve many community benefits.

“The CCE aims to encourage participation in sport and will link into recreation and activity programmes for young people across the region. This facility will offer more choice – in one place – than any other facility in New Zealand for our youth to enjoy,” says Len Brown.

“The Trusts Stadium’s location for the CCE ensures that people from across the region can get to it easily, whether they are using it as part of an organised recreation and activity programme, as a community group or for individual training.”

Councillor John Walker adds that Auckland Council’s aim to build healthy communities requires it to work with key partners and community and regional networks to ensure facilities, such as the CCE, align with recreation and activity programmes to meet the sporting needs of Aucklanders.

“As a council we recognise we must have a public facility that links into community based programmes if we are to achieve our goals around physical activity across the region.

"By aligning a facility and its offerings to existing successful public and community programmes, we will achieve excellent outcomes."

“We also want people to treat this facility as a place of their own, particularly our youth. It should be a place where they can meet to train, to challenge themselves to be New Zealand’s future champions, or to simply have fun playing sport with their peers,” says Cr Walker.

The $10m Auckland Council funding is part of a joint venture approach. The Trusts Stadium is proposing, between The Trusts Stadium, Auckland Council and SPARC, to create a world class facility for all Aucklanders to use throughout the year.

ENDS

© Scoop Media