New river valley bike park opening delayed until September

Heavy rain has the Edmonton Mountain Bike Alliance pressing the brakes on its bike park meant to open this month. CTV News Edmonton's Miriam Valdes-Carletti rep

Recent record rainfall in the city has delayed the completion of a new mountain bike park.

Construction of the Edmonton Bike Park started in mid-August last year. The $1.2-million project has been more than five years in the making by members of the Edmonton Mountain Bike Alliance, who spearheaded the creation of the park in the central river valley by raising money, finding volunteer labour, receiving donations of materials and equipment, and securing municipal and provincial funding.

Located east of the Walterdale Bridge in a wooded area on the south side of the river, the Edmonton Bike Park was slated to open on July 25. That date has been delayed until Sept. 5.

Matt Edwards, a bike alliance board member, says the extra time should allow workers to finish building the park “and have it completely ready and just the way we want it rolling for the grand opening.”

He said the group’s biggest issue following the heavy rain – Edmonton saw more than 260 millimetres fall on it in June, breaking a 112-year-old record – is the saturation of the soil. Edwards said “it’s going to take a while” for the ground to dry out enough for work to continue.

“It looks dry on surface (and) you can scrape the dirt, but if you look in other areas, you’ll see that even on some of these jumps here, you can see that it’s still muddy,” Edwards told CTV News Edmonton on Monday.

Once complete, the facility will include an asphalt surface pump track, several dirt jump lines, flow trails and skills areas.

With files from CTV News Edmonton’s Miriam Valdes-Carletti