Groundtrax enjoy huge success following Le Tour Yorkshire

A week after the Le Tour visited Harrogate, you would be hard pressed to know that one of the world’s largest sporting events had even been to Harrogate. This is due to both the impressive clean up by Harrogate Borough Council and the work carried out by local company Groundtrax Systems Ltd based in Ripley.

Director Simon Adams said “We were delighted to win the ground protection tender against some of the biggest companies in the business and proud to play a major part in the event. We provided the trackway and ground protection requirements for all the major festivals and events in the area including the TDF official areas and Fan zones in Harrogate, Harewood House, Broughton, Kilnsey and many others.

A full range of our products were installed including aluminium and plastic trackway, pedestrian walkway to protect the grass around the Cenotaph and we even provided temporary bridges at Harewood House and a walkway for the Royal party to get safely to the winner’s podium on Parliament Street. We understood throughout that it was vital to ensure the Stray was not damaged in any way and our Trackway provided a firm foundation for the many wagons and heavy plant that were used to facilitate the first stage of the Tour. We even provided French signage to make our visitors feel at home. With heavy rain overnight just prior to the start, at short notice we delivered an extra wagon load of ground protection mats on race day to provide additional ground protection. Many people were rightly concerned during the set up about the potential for damage but with our heavy duty systems in place we knew that the event could take place without any ill effects to the protected grassland on the Stray. Needing a Parliamentary hearing just to use the Stray, it really was a case of providing the best protection possible.

Groundtrax provide ground protection and reinforcement products to events, construction sites and infrastructure projects all over the United Kingdom but it has been particularly pleasing to be involved with all the major Tour de France events staged locally. With almost 200 tonnes of different products to install it was a major undertaking but all areas were completed ahead of schedule and removed without any surface damage. It was also great to get so much positive feedback from local people even as we removed the trackway from the Stray and it certainly seemed to make all the hard work worthwhile”