Bridge Climb Founder - Paul Cave

Without that passion for the Bridge and being obsessive, he jokes, the project would not have happened. Luckily for him, and the 1.5 million climbers who have already traversed the famous arches, he persevered. And despite the obvious frustrations of dealing with bureaucracy, Cave looks back positively on the experience. “Needing to do a lot more homework, after already having to do a hell of a lot,” he muses, “made us more committed to the whole thing.”

It’s easy now, given the huge success of the business, to say Cave was onto a winner, but luring investors was a struggle despite interest in the idea. It took like-minded entrepreneurs, such as Sanity Music’s Brett Blundy, to take up the challenge. “Within 60 seconds of mentioning it to him, he was in.” Others were more difficult to  convince. “Until we had the Heads of Agreement in place, I think a lot of people thought it was a bit pie-in-the-sky,” Cave admits of this first-of-its-kind project, with this precursor to a final contract enticing Jack Cowin (Hungry Jack’s founder) on board.

Cave’s next challenge was to keep their support. Refusing to compromise on the deal with government for anything other than a 20-year lease, tension ran high with investors while Cave struggled to get the deal over the line. Despite planning on two years to get up and running, the years ticked by and investors grew restless—Cave started work on the project in 1990, investors came on board in 1994, and BridgeClimb launched in 1998.

There were times when even he thought about throwing in the towel. Putting the plan to the stakeholders, Cave’s self-appointed job description became to pre-empt objections and have an answer for anything they might come up with. He was prepared to tackle the problem of reduced visibility from traffic by creating suits that blended with the Bridge; covering the maintenance costs of the Bridge as part of the proposed lease agreement; and answering problems with proximity to the train tracks during the climb (State Rail rules didn’t allow people to be within five metres of the Bridge without orange safety jackets, and this took two years to resolve despite climbers being harnessed to the Bridge with cages built around the ladders). “That’s an example of bureaucracy being obstructive, not constructive”. Other measures included adding breath testing to the pre-climb procedure, and taking out $50 million public risk insurance. Not that it’s been needed to date. Thanks to this thoroughness, and rigorous fencing with government bodies, he boasts, there haven’t been any accidents or significant injuries on the climb since opening.

There are significant financial obligations for BridgeClimb to lease the Bridge from the NSW government. As well as a base figure agreed at the start of the venture, there’s an escalating percentage of revenue, which will send the projected costs upward of $100 million by the end of the 20-year lease. “The business is totally run at our cost. My original approach was to offer $60 million for a 20-year lease, which was what the RTA said, then, was the cost of the maintenance of the Bridge,” Cave adds. “But they came back and took a base figure and an escalating percentage.”