Speedway future under threat as iconic Western Springs stadium languishes with flood damage

Friday, 18 August 2023

Fans desperate to see action at Western Springs say it's unacceptable the council took seven months to start work after the Auckland Anniversary Weekend floods, writes Steve Kilgallon.

“I’ve invested a hell of a lot in this sport over the last 20 years,” says speedway team owner Wayne Green, “and to have no sandpit to play in is quite distressing.”

It’s been seven months since heavy rains on Auckland Anniversary weekend caused flooding across the city - and the closure of the historic Western Springs Stadium, home to major rock gigs, rugby union, and famously, the sport of speedway.

But renovation work on the damaged stadium only began a few days ago - a rate of progress which has angered speedway fans, who fear they could go an entire season without racing, posing an existential threat to the sport at its spiritual home.

“It’s utterly disgraceful how long it has taken them to start,” says title-winning speedway driver Jamie McDonald. “Everyone has moved on from the flooding, and they haven’t even started repairing anything. We’ve got a clear sense they want us out of there, and I feel this is a really underhanded way of wanting to achieve that.”

When the waters came, they rose fast, washing 80mm high through the stadium’s main buildings. When they washed away, they left dead fish in the car park - used as the pits for speedway racing - and undermined its asphalt, leaving light towers on a lean. They drowned the switchboard and power supply, caused slips on the hillside above the terraces, and left the boundary wall high on the eastern hill unstable, causing risks to six adjoining houses.

At one stage, says Auckland Stadiums director James Parkinson, the water was thigh-high above the clay surface of the racetrack.

The stadium gates have remained locked ever since; a security guard on duty. Already, small manuka bushes have self-seeded on the terracing.

Parkinson says the council-owned Auckland Stadiums has “focused so far on investigative works” and is commencing physical work this week on the car park, and then on the main buildings.

But he admitted there was still design, engineering and consenting work before it could solve the two big issues - the power and that unstable wall.

He rejects any suggestion that Auckland Council could have moved quicker. “I certainly wouldn’t agree with it being slow… Seven months down the track there is not a lot visually to show for progress, but that doesn’t mean to say nothing has been happening,” he says. “The issues we are facing have a reasonably high degree of complexity attached.”

But speedway aficionados still say the council could have acted faster.

Green owns a demolition contracting business and says his staff were out doing insurance work within a fortnight of the floods and within days of Cyclone Gabrielle, stripping out damaged buildings.

“It’s getting frustrating: we don’t know where we stand,” he says. “We spend a lot of money, and we can’t even plan our season and make decisions [on where to race].”

McDonald - who has raced at Western Springs for 23 years - says electrical retailer JA Russell, one of his sponsors, offered council a report on how to fix the electrical issues.

“Council don’t seem interested in any help and want to go through a laborious, slow process, and wear us down until we don’t have a home any more,” he says.

Speedway fans are suspicious of the council after previous attempts to move them from the stadium to other venues, including Mt Smart Stadium and a failed greenfields plan near Auckland Airport, leading to a ‘Save our Speedway’ campaign.

Both McDonald and Green say they cannot plan their seasons or negotiate with sponsors because they lack certainty. “Sponsors get their best return at Western Springs, the most prestigious stadium in NZ if not the world,” says Green.

Speedway general manager John McCallum struck a placatory tone, saying they had worked hard on their relationship with their landlords, but admitted that there was sometimes a clash of styles between “private commercial enterprise and government or council-style bureaucracy”.

“In the case of these stadium repairs, it certainly appears that not a lot has physically happened since the floods of late January and now,” he said. “Although we believe that there is plenty going on in the background to facilitate the necessary repairs to the stadium, without anything tangible to show the many affected parties it is at times difficult to keep all these enquirers satisfied that progress is being made.”

McCallum said some, including the council, underestimated the passion of speedway’s following and the industry around it. He said he was confident with “cooperation and compromise” there could be some racing in early 2024.

“It would be a shame to think with the machinery and technology that is available today, that a flood that occurred 10 months before our scheduled opening date could wipe us out for the whole season.”

‘A huge struggle’

The stadium is also home to Auckland’s oldest rugby union club, Ponsonby, which moved there in 1997.

Silt stains the floors of their clubroom, where the beer taps still sit on the bar but all the memorabilia has been stripped from the walls. Ponsonby stalwarts loaded all their gear onto pallets and into storage in the days after the flood, but have lost a lot.

Ironically, the playing surface of the infield, which becomes Ponsonby’s home pitch in the rugby season, is immaculate. Auckland Council pressed ahead with plans to re-lay the field while the stadium was closed - so the new surface has yet to host a single fixture.

The Ponsonby president, former All Black Bryan Williams, said they’d had an “indication” they should be allowed back into the stadium just before the 2024 season commences in April.

“It’s been a huge struggle,” he said. “It was heartbreaking when we saw the clubrooms. We’ve got 150 years of history and a lot of our memorabilia was damaged beyond repair. But the club has battled on through and shown a lot of resilience.”

Williams says the club is grateful to the council, who moved them to the nearby Cox’s Bay Reserve, installing temporary training lights for them. Other clubs loaned fields and facilities, and the club still won the women’s and men’s under-85kg championships.

But Williams says they’ve had “next to no income coming in” without a bar on home match days.

Work begins

On Tuesday, contractors were on site, but visible work had yet to commence.

Parkinson says he cannot yet give firm time frames for each group to return to the stadium.

He hopes rugby will kick off the new season there, while he says speedway definitely won’t be in before Christmas and “we are in ongoing discussions with them about different options as to how early in the New Year it might be possible for them to get underway”.

Speedway has a council-determined season cut-off in March, and asked if it was possible the entire season would be cancelled, he said: “The information we’ve got at the moment would suggest they can get in before the end of their season”, but he said that depended on remediation work.

Parkinson said neither group had been charged rent during the closure, and the council had helped Ponsonby with their temporary Cox’s Bay move, and had commissioned a report to see if there was a temporary move available for speedway (it had not yet been received).

Concerts on the outer field are unaffected, with Post Malone due in November, but the stadium’s high-capacity interior gigs are impacted.

The Laneway Festival was due to be held on the weekend the water came - it took several days to pack out the already-constructed main stage when it was cancelled. Parkinson said they were looking at reconfiguration options for the stadium and Laneway was “one of several parties we are continuing to have discussions with to see what might be possible”.

Speedway fans say if Laneway is held before they begin racing again that is unfair. Their hope is racing in February, allowing five meets before the season end.

Promoter Bruce Robertson’s licence expires at the end of this season, but Parkinson said renewal was “not a current conversation”.

What might cheer up speedway fans is the diggers rolling in. Parkinson said council had “worked constructively with all its stakeholders” and added: “We think progress will start to give all parties some confidence, and I think the next couple of weeks will be quite important in terms of starting to demonstrate that progress has been made.”