The L'Etape Australia cycle race may have put the community in a spin when word of road closures filtered out, but the event's cancellation this afternoon has many Robertson residents and businesses equally disconcerted.
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The Illawarra Fly, which was rendered inaccessible in the planned closure of Jamberoo Mountain Road, had blanked out bookings for the day and told staff not to come to work.
Following the cancellation, Amy Prytherch, commercial supervisor at the Illawarra Fly, said they were unsure what to do.
"We're right now deciding whether to reopen again," she said.
"We don't know whether to just leave it."
The Fly usually employs 10 people on a Saturday, to take 16 tours (with six people in each) on treetop and zipline adventures.
"If we had it open, we would have booked out, because we've been booking out every weekend," Ms Prytherch said.
"Now we have no bookings, and they have no race, so it's a lose-lose situation, but you can't control the weather."
She said there had "100 per cent not been enough communication" in the lead-up to the now cancelled event, with staff having to do their own research and inform customers, so she hopes the organisers have learned from the experience.
The event is expected to be re-scheduled to early December.
"There was no communication whatsoever, and lots of frustration in the community," said Ms Prytherch.
"It's postponed, so it will affect us for another day, but hopefully they'll let us know in advance next time."
At the Robertson Hotel, wedding and events manager Kaity Sutherland spent weeks sending emails to clarify road closures for the event, and making alternative arrangements for the wedding guests they had booked in for the day.
She's relieved the event is no longer scheduled, but echoes the hopes that L'Etape Australia has learned from the experience.
"I suppose I'll have to contact the wedding couple for this Saturday and let them know that all the stress and complicated instructions for getting here are now irrelevant," said Ms Sutherland.
"I just hope that just going forward, the communication level is better this time, and that they've learned their lesson."
She added that the cancellation - after all the effort put in by organisers - came as a surprise.
"I'm shocked, and feel very sad for them," Ms Sutherland said.
"They've copped a lot of flak from a lot of people - communication seems to have been the big problem.
"I do feel a bit bad for them for all the work they've put in."
Robertson Business Chamber president Tim Hewitt said he was very disappointed with the news, but hoped to see it back "bigger and better" in December.
"I guess the hard thing is that now we still don't know what the real effect would have been," said Mr Hewitt.
"If it had run and there'd been 1000 spectators in town, then people might have said, 'Oh, I get it now'."
He said he'd be packing away all the flags he'd bought and saving them until the next attempt, but had hopes this weekend may still bring some tourists to town.
"I suppose it puts us on the bike riding map - there's definitely been a lot of cyclists out riding around practicing," he said.
"A lot were coming from interstate, and they'd have supporters with them too, so maybe they'll get out and about on the weekend.
"And maybe the hard core riders might say, 'Stuff this, we'll go out and ride anyway'."
Race organisers posted this notice on their Facebook page at 4pm this afternoon:
Lateral Events, organisers of L'Étape Australia by Tour de France, in consultation with the State Authorities and in agreement with Kiama Municipal Council, the Shoalhaven City Council and the Wingecarribee Shire Council, have announced the cancellation of the event due to the inclement weather forecast this weekend in NSW.
For the last 72 hours, the weather forecast for Kiama, the Shoalhaven and the Southern Highlands has consistently worsened. On Wednesday, March 17 at 4:30pm, 70mm to 120mm of rain was forecasted for Saturday, March 20, making the course unsafe to deliver the only Tour de France event in Australia. This forecast was confirmed again at 11:30 am on Thursday, March 18 at which time the announcement has been made that the event has been cancelled.
The cancellation of the event means there will NOT be any road closures implemented on Saturday, March 20.
L'Étape Australia is the only Tour de France event in Australia. The fifth edition, initially scheduled for November 2020, had been postponed to March 19-20, 2021.
The 5th edition of L'Étape Australia will now be staged early December 2021, and community engagement will resume in the coming weeks.
We would like to thank all the local residents and local business owners for their understanding, and we are looking forward to bringing the Tour de France to Kiama, the Shoalhaven and the Southern Highlands at the end of the year.
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