The Skelf Bike Skills Park

Latest News, April 2016

• Local Councillors have now explicitly confirmed the public consultations around both the lease and the planning application were carried out properly, and as a result there are no grounds to challenge either the planning consent or the lease.

• Our petition in support of the project rapidly reached more than 2000 signatures, making it perfectly clear a lot of people support the project

• We have now had a series of very productive meetings with concerned local residents (organised through the new Dumbiedykes Residents Association). It's safe to say, while a handful of people do remain firmly opposed, most can now see the benefits of the project, as well as the other opportunities a woodland managed for community benefit might offer to local people (space for allotments, community garden, outdoor gym etc). We are actively encouraging Dumbiedykes residents and others living near the site to work with us to make ideas like these (which can only benefit everyone) become a reality.

• We are again moving ahead with preparing the site for construction of the bike trails to take place this autumn.

• To this end, a few weekends back we had our first Skelf Tree Planting Day, with volunteers working in all weathers planting trees/picking up rubbish etc.

• We are following up on this with a series of other work days between now and September, and are keen to get as many people involved in these as possible

• Our next work day is a week on Sunday (ie the 24th April) from 10am-2pm. More details here