By CASEY NEILL
A CABLE water-ski centre could bring 90,000 people to Bangholme each year.
This month Activ will apply for permits to build the $5 million Melbourne Cable Park (MCP) in Riverend Road, adjacent to the National Watersports Centre (NWSC) on Patterson River.
The company has leased a grassed area that the State Government declared surplus to its needs and plans to build lakes for a variety of events including water-skiing, wakeboarding, kayaking and stand-up paddle boarding.
“It’s the orphan that everybody forgot about,” Activ managing director Ian Clark said.
“For 20 years this has just been grass.”
By the end of the year it could be home to two full lake systems with skate park-like obstacles and circular cable tracks to tow users.
Another two lakes will have what’s known as two-tower systems, which take the user from one side of the lake to the other and are designed for beginners.
Mr Clark said construction and operation would not impact usage at NWSC and would complement many existing activities.
“We don’t want to impact existing users,” he said.
He said solar panels would power the cable systems, which each use as much electricity as two washing machines.
He said it was an environmentally sustainable way to water-ski and would open the sport to people who had previously been excluded by the need for a boat.
Cable wakeboarding will be a demonstration sport at the 2016 and 2020 Olympic Games, and Mr Clark said it was a strong contender to be an official sport in 2024.
He said the park would average about 250 visitors per day and said more than 360 people had already inquired about park membership.
Activ has established a web presence in China and Mr Clark expects the park would also attract tourists from closer to home.
He said the park would create more than 50 jobs directly and about another 50 during construction, and the MCP website had already received 180-plus expressions of interest in jobs or traineeships.
Mr Clark said the tourism and job generation would total $60 million of economic benefit for the region in the park’s first year and about $40 million in subsequent years.
“We’re driving economic stimulus,” he said.
He said the centre would be open seven days a week, would suit school, community group and corporate use, and would also feature a high ropes adventure challenge, cafe and inflatable aqua fun park.
Rip Curl will locate its global wakeboard product development centre at the park.
Wetsuit division chairman Michael Ray said the company currently used similar facilities overseas for product development and photo shoots.
“To be able to use a facility right here in Melbourne will be fantastic,” he said.
Mr Clark said a traffic report indicated the park would have no implications, though he’ll advocate for a Riverend Road upgrade to add a bike path and improve the surface.
He’s also asking for an existing bus route to be extended to include the centre and is working with neighbouring Cornish College on this and other ideas.
The park is in a green wedge zone but Mr Clark said it fitted in with recommended usage and that he will need a water permit because the land is inside an Eastern Treatment Plant buffer.
Visit www.melbournecablepark.com for more information.
