Nine years on, weather delays Burnham Park synthetic track

– Regional Chairman says specialised surface requires precise conditions

Almost nine years after work began on the synthetic track at Burnham Park in New Amsterdam, the facility remains incomplete, with Region Six Chairman Junior Basant identifying weather conditions as the main obstacle to completing the specialised surface.
Basant provided an update during Thursday’s statutory meeting of the Region Six Regional Democratic Council (RDC), explaining that several components of the wider Burnham Park development are being undertaken simultaneously.
However, he identified the installation of the remaining rubberised material on the track as the regional administration’s greatest concern.
“But our greatest concern at this point in time is the rubber insulation, which is the matting on the track itself,” Basant told councillors.
According to the Regional Chairman, the specialised work requires precise weather and temperature conditions, severely limiting the amount of time contractors can spend installing the material each day.

“Based on the advice of the experts who are doing it, this thing can only happen for maybe an hour at most per day,” he explained.
Basant said neither rainfall nor intense sunshine provides suitable conditions for the installation.
“It cannot be a rainy day, nor can it be a day when the sun is shining brightly. So, it has to have that right balance,” he said.
The Regional Chairman added that the work cannot simply be undertaken whenever contractors are available because the installation requires specific climatic conditions.
“That is the biggest hindrance to the works progressing on this synthetic track,” he told the RDC.
While completion of the surface remains a challenge, Basant reported that other components of the Burnham Park development are moving ahead.
Washroom facilities are being constructed near Berbice High School, while additional stands are expected to be erected at the synthetic track. Work is also progressing on parking facilities.
Basant said an area around the former dumpsite has already been covered with crusher run and is expected to be developed into a parking area.
“But other than that, all other projects are ongoing, and they are moving at a pace with which we are satisfied at the regional level,” he said.
The latest explanation comes against the backdrop of a project that has experienced years of delays and several projected completion dates.
Plans for a synthetic athletics facility at Burnham Park date back to 2017, when the Government announced that the location had been identified for the development of a world-class athletics track to serve Berbice.
The plans included a 400-metre, eight-lane synthetic track, a full-sized football field and facilities for field events, including the javelin, discus, shot put and jumping disciplines.
Major works were underway by 2018, with BK International Inc. being awarded an approximately $141 million contract for a phase of the development involving land clearing, drainage, construction of the inner and outer track, and asphalting.
At the time, completion of the facility was anticipated in 2019.
That deadline passed, and in late 2019, the then Government indicated that the asphalt works would be completed, while the installation of the synthetic material and other supporting infrastructure would continue into 2020.
However, the project remained incomplete.
By August 2022, President Dr Irfaan Ali acknowledged that the synthetic track projects in New Amsterdam and Linden had been long delayed and announced that additional resources would be made available to complete them.
In January 2023, Minister of Culture, Youth and Sport Charles Ramson Jr. told the National Assembly that approximately $320 million had already been spent on the Region Six synthetic track project.
Work continued throughout 2024 and 2025. In October 2025, Ramson reported that the New Amsterdam synthetic track was approximately 85 per cent complete.
The Minister said the synthetic material had been purchased by the Government in 2021 and arrived in Guyana in early 2022.
The Government had expected the synthetic surface to be installed during the first quarter of 2025, but prolonged rainfall was subsequently cited as contributing to further delays.
There appeared to be significant movement on the project earlier this year. In March, the Government reported that installation of the synthetic surface was underway under the supervision of specialists from German manufacturer REGUPOL.
At the time, the facility was again reported to be approximately 85 per cent complete.
Ramson indicated that athletes could gain access to the New Amsterdam track within approximately one month, with the official opening expected sometime thereafter. That anticipated timeframe has since passed without the track being commissioned.
In April, Ramson provided another update, saying the wider redevelopment of Burnham Park was on course for completion by the end of 2026.
That deadline has not yet passed, and work continues on several components of the development. However, Basant’s update to the RDC on Thursday makes clear that the specialised track surface—the central component of the athletics facility—remains unfinished.
Almost nine years after the Burnham Park synthetic track project began, work is therefore continuing on the track, additional stands, washrooms and parking facilities.
While the regional administration says the other components are progressing satisfactorily, completion of the track remains dependent on contractors getting the precise weather conditions required to finish laying the specialised surface.