Fox Creek Bike Park supports a huge range of people and businesses.

The Fox Creek skills park is a fantastic development but the area has so much more potential for growth.

The South Australian mountain biking community has understandably reacted with disappointment at the new State Labor Government’s decision to deny $5.25 million in funding for the planned upgrades and expansion of the enormously popular Fox Creek Bike Park in Cudlee Creek in the Adelaide Hills.

And well they might. Thousands of hours of work – much of it voluntary – has gone into rebuilding and rehabilitating the area since the disastrous bushfires of 2019 and multitudes of riders are now exploring the trails and exciting new features on offer.

But it has potential for so much more!

And this is the key point. That money was to go towards making Fox Creek a national cycle tourism destination, much like Derby in Tasmania and the Victorian and New South Wales alpine regions draw intense and lucrative MTB tourism as riders constantly seek new thrills on new trails.

All of which is to say that this investment was to be to the benefit of so many more South Australians than just its MTB riders. Businesses, towns, restaurants, wineries, accommodation venues, service providers – all these and more would benefit from the planned improvements at Fox Creek and elsewhere that were planned to make the whole of the Adelaide Hills region and beyond a huge network of MTB, gravel and road riding opportunities.

Transport and Infrastructure Minister Tom Koutsantonis said the government was redirecting the money to its priorities of “health, education, infrastructure and jobs”. However, we contend the expanded infrastructure of the MTB precinct and the physical fitness, skills development and tourism work it would create tick all those boxes.

Given that Labor’s egalitarian, health and environmental values align so strongly with cycling’s and Bicycle SA’s values and actions, we keenly anticipate achieving great things in the coming years of this government. We hoped, however, that the hugely popular Fox Creek development could have led the way.

Work done in the area in the separate $2.5 million Bushfire Recovery Program that began in January 2020 has included 26km of re-opened tracks, 19 restored trails, six new or improved trails including SA’s first adaptable mountain bike trail and a skills park and coaching area, with a new trail hub featuring toilets, a bike wash and a kiosk on target for completion this spring. These are all enormously encouraging.

But the $5.25 million had been earmarked to significantly expand the trail network, provide infrastructure to enable Fox Creek to support more and higher-level MTB events and improve amenities and provide the opportunities for business and accommodation project developments. All of which would combine to provide another highly valuable attraction in the Adelaide Hills to entice local and interstate visitors to invest in the region and, of course, to encourage coming generations into healthy, energetic activity.

During the pandemic, we watched as countless places around the world took the opportunity to reduce the absolute primacy of place motor vehicles have in our transport hierarchy by replacing car parking with cycle lanes, expanding active transport networks and creating low-traffic neighbourhoods. And their communities, businesses and environments reaped the rewards of that strong leadership.

Meanwhile, here in Adelaide, we failed to seize that opportunity. That inertia should stop now.

Continuing to build on the strong reputation South Australia has as a cycle tourism destination – a reputation earned by years of vision and hard work – is not simply a treat for cyclists and their entertainment. It is a wise investment in tourism, businesses of all shapes and sizes and the opportunities that may not even be on our radar yet.

It is worth it.