UCI cycling championships left Harrogate a mud bath with a damaged reputation - Yorkshire Post letters

From: Tim Flanagan, Ripon.
Spectators watch the 2019 UCI Cycling Road World Championship in Harrogate.Spectators watch the 2019 UCI Cycling Road World Championship in Harrogate.
Spectators watch the 2019 UCI Cycling Road World Championship in Harrogate.

PARDON me for putting my spoke in on Harrogate Borough Council’s reported £17.8m ‘boost’ to the local economy delivered courtesy of the UCI cycling event that cost council tax payers in excess of £600,000.

UCI Road World Championships showed why people do not commute by bike in Yorkshire - Yorkshire Post lettersLong after the last peloton rider pedalled out of town on that soggy September day we, the council tax payers, business rate payers and local residents of all ages, have been saddled with the sorry aftermath caused through a massive loss of amenity and a reputation for the town, that is now diminished and splattered with mud.

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Any motorist, cyclist, pedestrian, dog walker, bus or coach passenger passing the quagmire, no-go area mess of what was a formerly glorious gateway to the formerly national and international, world-class multiple award-winning bloom town, can witness on a daily basis the damage, not only to the Stray, but also Harrogate’s reputation.

The Stray in Harrogate after the event.The Stray in Harrogate after the event.
The Stray in Harrogate after the event.

Harrogate gained nothing from hosting UCI Road World Cycling Championships: Yorkshire Post LettersI ask myself, have the Otley Road/West Park Stray crocuses – which for as long as I can remember – been a joyous spring-time treat and symbol of the town’s floral heritage – survived?

Or have they croaked, having been choked by the mud? And when will I be able to take my youngest grandchild – now aged three – for his first football kick around on the area of land where I was introduced to the beautiful game?

Yorkshire’s love affair with cycling hits the seven-year itch – David BehrensI’m afraid I find the sugar-coated take on the Ernst & Young impact report a little hard to swallow, while we who pay for council services are forced to wallow in the inglorious mud the UCI event left behind.

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And what will be the council’s next big attraction and attention grabber? Perhaps the 2021 West Park World Mud Wrestling Championships? Or perhaps they could fence off the whole area and introduce a mating pair of mud-loving hippos!