working in partnership with operator, Greenwich Leisure Ltd., and other leisure providers at its venues, LPFF have established a successful business model, which combines a modern health and fitness centre with a first-class multi-sport hub that is able to generate income to reinvest back into turf maintenance programmes.
Six of their other seven locations,
Fairlop Oak Playing Field; London Marathon Playing Field (LMPF) Redbridge; LMPF Greenwich; LMPF Greenford; Douglas Eyre Sports Centre, Boston Manor Playing Field, Hounslow are a mixture of indoor and outdoor provision, and making quality and inclusion their governing principles. The eighth site - Prince George’s Playing Fields, Merton - is leased to David Lloyd Leisure Ltd. For Alex, the key to the success of
grass-roots pitches is in providing quality, because high standards generate throughput. “The best defence against playing field closures is high usage. If you can make fields attractive and of good quality, they will be well utilised. Only when standards slip does the community lose interest.”
“In the beginning we felt that, to make this work, there needed to be multiple elements - not only high calibre playing fields, but also an indoor provision that would bring users to the site throughout the year,” Alex explains. “As cricket was our biggest draw, we believed that making this a hub for the sport could prove successful, and there was nothing in the area working to the model we had planned - with the same level of indoor provision.”
The indoor 27m x 31m sports hall was created to accommodate winter Uniturf
cricket practice, with its six lanes, sprung floor and shockpad. It is the most heavily used indoor cricket facility in the region and a good part of the reason Essex County Cricket Club were attracted to the venue.
Whilst ensuring that a solid business model is in place is crucial to long-term sustainability, the primary goals of LPFF are to promote playing fields and ensure that pitches have a voice. For Alex, there still remains much to be done to see that playing fields are better utilised and maintained. “Grass-roots developments need to be much more articulate in promoting their social and health benefits,” says Alex, “and more effective at working in collaboration with business partners, often from outside the sports sector.” “As well as its health benefits, sport is a fantastic tool for engagement with hard to reach groups and brings the community together.”
“Playing field usage should be underpinned by sports development principles, rather than marketed on a first come, first served basis. Too often the management, marketing and maintenance of local authority pitches are overseen by different departments working to different agendas,” he insists. It is projects like the Peter May Sports
Centre that Alex believes offer the kind of multi-use development needed to allow pitches to prosper. ”The Peter May is a multi-sport hub - a sun in a solar system of smaller facilities. Such centres can help drive sports development locally,” he states. In the LPFF’s work with the London Mayor’s Office, they identified a network of existing and potential multi-sport hubs across the capital as part of a wider
2012 Legacy Plan for grass-roots sport. The network provides a framework for strategic investment for the Mayor’s Play Sport Legacy Fund. Each site within the framework complied with a set of key characteristics (based on the Peter May Sports Centre experience), which aimed at getting more people to play sport. The investment needed to develop the whole network was £173m, with only 13% matched funding already in place. “At a time when there are many more opportunities to do things in what is classified as leisure time, we need to provide the best experience possible so that the customer wants to return time and again,” he explains. “This entails ensuring clubs have access to facilities that are not just attractive, but also are provided in the right location and used to full capacity. Clubs cannot rest on their laurels, expecting members to turn up every week.”
”They should have an understanding of where the club fits within the bigger picture, and be prepared to change with the times. Just because a club has always existed, and has a history, does not mean that it is the right model for the 21st century.”
One of the guiding principles of the
LPFF’s approach to pitch maintenance is to offer a solid start in the industry for young and aspiring groundsmen. The age bracket across their seven sites is wide; from their most senior groundsman, 65-year-old Colin Howard at Douglas Eyre, to the two youngest, who are both based at the Peter May Sports Centre. The turfcare duo, who are required to meet a punishing schedule of seasonal sports, are twenty-six year old Paul Cox
supermarket, or retail outlet, remember that, once upon a time, you might have been standing in the centre circle of a football pitch or on a cricket wicket”
“Next time you’re in a new Alex Welsh, LPFF Chief Executive
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