Huzzah! The first delivery(Image credit: Rob Good)
Ready to unload.(Image credit: Rob Good)
Huzzah! The first delivery has arrived!(Image credit: Rob Good/Forest City Velodrome)
Ready to unload.(Image credit: Rob Good/Forest City Velodrome)
The first sections of wood, ready to be laid out. They're gonna need a lot more than that, though...(Image credit: Rob Good/Forest City Velodrome)
Based in London, Ontario, Canada, the Forest City Velodrome project is an atypical but ingenious cycling initiative whereby individuals, corporations and government can all own a share in this publicly-held corporation. Businesses and members of the public can become involved by owning shares in the track itself; donating to the not-for-profit corporation; becoming a partner; or volunteering time to help run learn-to-race and other development programs.
Construction of the 3,000 seat, 142 metre indoor cycling track is now underway, as can be seen from the pictures, and when complete, the Forest City Velodrome will be one of only three indoor velodromes in North America.
Designed by Albert Coulier, the track will be built in the vacant Ice House hockey arena in the south end of London (again, that's London, Ontario, in case you were wondering). Coulier's company, Apollo Velodrome Systems, has constructed dozens of tracks over the decades, including Olympic and world championship tracks in Montreal, Pan-Am tracks in Winnipeg and other temporary tracks in arenas in Canada and the United States.
Garnering the support of local business, community and government partners to finance the project, one of the primary aims is to bring new, young Canadian talent into the sport, while elite athletes can train indoors during the winter to prepare themselves for international competition that culminates in the world track championships, now in February each year.
