District of North Vancouver (DNV) Councillors received three presentations at last night’s Council meeting from local tennis players protesting unprecedented rumoured cuts to the community’s much-loved tennis courts.
Two Directors of the North Shore Tennis Society — its President, Michael Anderson, and Cecilia McLaren, who is also a Director of the Deep Cove Tennis Club — addressed the Council.
Michael Anderson highlighted the growth in popularity of tennis across Canada as well as the current shortage of tennis courts in DNV. The North Vancouver Tennis Centre is bursting at its seams with all programs fully booked and even waiting lists closed. Cecilia McLaren highlighted the physical and mental benefits of playing tennis.
The Society showed that today there are over 10,500 tennis players in the District of North Vancouver compared to the fewer than 1,000 pickleball players.
It was noted that currently DNV provides more indoor pickleball courts (16) than indoor tennis courts (9) and has announced plans to build further indoor pickleball courts e.g. at the new Lions Gate Rec Centre, but no new tennis courts.
For outdoor courts, today DNV provides one tennis court for every 239 tennis players but compared to one pickleball court for every 118 pickleball players.
Michael Anderson commented: “This disparity shows there is a greater need for more tennis courts in North Vancouver than for more pickleball courts. So what does the DNV in its wisdom decide? To close five further tennis courts and spend money converting these spaces to create up to 20 new pickleball courts. This is manifestly unfair. Moreover, it is wrong.
“Policy used to be decided by careful analysis with Councillors involved. Today’s decision-making appears to be a closed-door affair won by lobbyists and private deals to promote the interests of a private local pickleball club, the result of private discussion directly between DNV staff and their former colleagues, without proper research, disclosure and process. Promises are made, then broken. Facts are then distorted or invented to cover the resulting mess. The lack of openness is appalling. I think some of the councillors are starting to understand this. We’ve asked that there be a better way. Tennis players deserve it. We’re citizens too. We pay taxes. And we are far greater in number than those being given our courts.”
Gloria Anderson, Chair of the Seniors Tennis Association of the North Shore (STANS — https://seniorstennis.ca/), also addressed the Council, stating that cuts to tennis courts apparently planned (but not publicly announced) at Little Cates Park had resulted in the decision by DNV to deny STANS’ application to renew its long-standing permit for members to play at Little Cates.
“We were not informed or consulted about this decision, and like Council’s decision on multilining, we cannot find a record of it. On behalf of the senior tennis players in North Vancouver, we are asking Council to reverse this decision and, if pickleball courts are needed, build them in a way that does not harm the tennis community, especially our seniors. I have heard that some Councillors believe that tennis is a young person’s sport and that most pickleball players are seniors. Nothing could be further from the truth. An independent national study on tennis participation found that 13% of tennis players are seniors. We are not happy about Council’s decision to reallocate tennis courts to pickleball,” she said.
“Of course, we support the creation of dedicated pickleball courts. But we agree with Tennis BC and Pickleball BC, that this should not harm the tennis community. Unfortunately, Council’s decision to convert tennis courts to pickleball courts does harm our community. We are asking the District of North Vancouver to pause and reflect, and examine the facts and the true needs of each sport. We plead with councillors to show some respect to the 24,000 residents of the North Shore who play Tennis to Save our Tennis Courts. We all need to Rally for Tennis,” Anderson said.
The North Shore Tennis Society, upon hearing rumours of the planned appropriation of tennis courts to pickleball use, sought to engage with the Council. Letters were written to the Mayor requesting detail of the plans and what procedures and needs assessments had been undertaken to inform the decision.
The letters also noted an upcoming needs assessment being performed by the local Sports Advisory Council and queried why decisions were being taken in advance of this. Finally, the letters suggested other sites suitable for the creation of pickleball hubs.
Michael Anderson complained: “Our letters requested answers to perfectly reasonable questions and the provision of the Council information upon which these decisions are being made. Unfortunately, neither letter was answered in writing as we requested. We were invited to a coffee meeting with the Mayor who told us orally that two tennis courts in Little Cates Park, two (both) tennis courts at Institute Road and either one or two (both) tennis courts at Evelyn Park would all be closed and turned so that the Council could invest in building brand new pickleball courts. The Mayor was deaf to our entreaties and seems to side completely with his pickleball friends and to be acting against the interests of tennis players in his community. For some reason, DNV will not make a public statement of its tennis court closure policy.”
The North Shore Tennis Society is under pressure from its members to do more to preserve the tennis facilities across the North Shore and especially within DNV. Accordingly, the Society plans an outreach campaign to the whole tennis community; all residents who will be adversely affected by pickleball noise and increased congestion near their homes; and all members of the public who believe in transparency, fairness and equity in municipal decision-making.
I will be reflecting my dissatisfaction with the current government when it comes time for local elections. I hope that other tennis players do the same.
This special interest group is the same one that conned the Rec Commission into spending millions building and now subsidizing the indoor centre on Lloyd…… public money for private interest. As far the tennis participation rate is concerned, sports organizations and special interest groups have a poor relationship with reality. In fact, tennis participation rates are down, the mean age of the tennis population is going up, and while I’m not a pickleball player, it is the growth sport.
Absolutely not true re the North Vancouver Tennis Centre. It was formed with funds raised by the North Shore Indoor Tennis Society and is absolutely rammed. You can’t get a booking card, all the programs are full, you can’t arrange coaching there etc – it charges a lot for court time ($45 per hour) and for programs, such that it more than covers its operating costs.
Also not true re tennis – it’s a growth sport, especially on the north shore, thanks to our leisure focus and demographic. Plus now WFH and hybrid working gives many people more time even in their working day to play an hour’s tennis locally.
Pickleball is also new and currently popular and a growth sport, but of course from a tiny base. The North Shore pickleball club has been stuck at around 500 members across DNV, CNV and DWV for three years now – from 2019 to 2022 – their published statistics. National statistics show about 10% of Canadians play tennis and 0.9% play pickleball. Both percentages are likely higher on the north shore.
The mean age is not really relevant, tennis is a sport for all – witness the kids packing out the NVTC and the elite tennis program for the 3 West Van public schools. The success of the professionals, Leyla Fernandez, Shapovalov, Felix etc has spurred further interest.
What exactly do you mean by the phrase ‘formed with funds’? Are you really trying to suggest the millions of dollars associated with buying/using the land and construction were provided by the North Shore Indoor Tennis Society? If so, you are smoking something.
I don’t object to government creating public recreation facilities when it is the best option. The fact is, it wasn’t the best option and wasn’t even close. And in terms of national statistics just realize numbers in sports are notoriously inflated often by provincial sport organizations like Tennis BC that have figured out how to ‘juice’ the numbers to justify provincial and federal sport funding. Special interest groups then run with these inflated numbers. Do you really believe 10% of Canadians play tennis? What a ridiculous figure…. or perhaps you mean picked up a racquet once in the last 10 years? I guess 50% of Canadians swim because they were at the beach once in the last year.
actually you might want to check with the district as I believe the tennis centre on Lloyd avenue is self sustaining with the revenues it generates, paying for the cost. Suggest maybe you take 15 minutes and drop by the tennis centre and see how busty it is and how quickly the kids programs fill up, that doesn’t reflect a drop in participation rates. Get your facts straight.
It’s actually public money for public interest, the people that play tennis are the voters of North Vancouver.
Also love to see evidence of tennis participation rates being down. In fact we have opportunities now to grow the sport exponentially with the new young talent we have at the pro level.
Please also note, these outdoor courts provide the cheapest solution to get the most people out playing tennis , getting exercise, staying healthy and reducing the burden on our medical system. If you had learned anything in school you would know that a healthy population is cheaper, happier and better for all, including you.
There are indeed some attractive female players, but I find it advisable not to see how busty they are
Too funny. I’m sure you don’t know how to read financials or understand their construction and how heavy subsidies related to services provided to the tennis centre result in many expense items grossly understated, some completely omitted. They are just District ‘administration and overhead’. And let’s not even talk about a return on the millions of dollar of capital invested.
In terms of public money for public interest, it is more correctly a gross amount of public money for a small interest group where this public money wasn’t required…. there were many P3 options like the Coquitlam Centre that required NO public funds. Again don’t make me laugh with the 10% figure. You quote participation rates of tennis based on ‘national statistics’ as being more than 10x that of pickleball. May I remind you, pickleball’s growth HAS expanded exponentially over the past year. and is predicted to overtake tennis within a decade. Again I’m not a pickleball player but play tennis 3-4x a week with probably 100 different players at 3 different facilities during the year. I’d have to search hard to find even 10 of these players that don’t play pickleball.
In terms of exponential growth due to young talent, you’re trodding out the same nonsense published by sport organizations.
This entire thread began as a comparison of pickleball and tennnis, the former providing the same amount of exercise as the latter, the former requiring 1/3 of the space needed for tennis and being more suitable for an aging demographic.