Video: New Taoiseach promise “velodrome is next”. Will he deliver?
He’s taking over running the country, but will Leo Varadkar honour his very public promise on a new velodrome for Ireland?
He may have been minister for social protection when he promised Ireland’s new velodrome was the next sports project in the queue.
But now Leo Varadkar is taking over as Taoiseach. So the question is now whether he will keep that pledge.
Less than five months ago, Varadkar was at the opening of the new National Indoor Arena on the National Sports Campus in Abbottstown, west Dublin.
He went out of his way to record a video and posted it online, promising very publicly that a velodrome was next.
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“I turned the sod on this facility when I was sports minister a couple of years ago and it’s just wonderful to see it come to fruition,” he said at the arena opening in January.
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“It’s the keystone of our sporting infrastructure up here on the campus.
“There’s lots of other facilities here already and the next step, of course, is the velodrome and covered training pitches for soccer and rugby. It’s a great project.”
The project has had many false dawns, with Cycling Ireland promising again and again it was about to happen only for it to be proven wrong.
Frustration has understandable grown with the cycling community. And now the delays have gone on for so long that it’s unlikely the project, even Varadkar keeps his word now as Taoiseach, the velodrome would be ready before the 2020 Olympics.
All eyes will be on the Government’s spending estimates in October for 2018. If the project were to go ahead, it would need to be provided for in the estimates.
The long promised facility is envisaged as a shared one between Cycling Ireland and Badminton Ireland.
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