Burnley parks tennis courts served an upgrade to encourage more to take part

Scott Park, Memorial Park, Ightenhill Park and Queen’s Park are all benefiting from the love-ly facelift, which comes as part of an investment in local facilities by Burnley Council, the UK Government and the Lawn Tennis Association Tennis Foundation.

Alongside the £58,860 investment, the council and Burnley Tennis Club will also work with the LTA to deliver a range of coaching activities across the park sites.

This will include weekly organised free tennis sessions for all ages, playing levels and experience, where equipment is provided, meaning that people will not need someone to play with or their own racket.

As part of the scheme, the courts will be secured using a gate access and pin code system and will need to be pre-booked via an online system at a charge of £3 an hour, although there will be regular free sessions available as well. A season ticket will cost £35 and cover up to five people.

Details on how to book a local court, and how the scheme works are available at www.lta.org.uk/play

Any money raised will be set aside for future repair and maintenance of the courts, as well as further improvements.

Work to upgrade the courts has been completed with the scheme set to come into operation from May 30.

The initiative will be officially launched at Scott Park on Sunday, June 18, with Burnley Tennis Club providing fun taster sessions. Places can be booked at https://clubspark.lta.org.uk/ScottParkBurnley/Events

Coun. John Harbour, the council’s executive member for housing and green spaces, said: “We’re aware that introducing a small charge could be prohibitive to some but we will continue to offer free sessions at certain times and we have kept any charge to a minimum. By introducing a booking system people can be assured that when they turn up to play a court will be available to them which will encourage them to use the facilities.”

Players of all ages and experience are being encouraged to join the Burnley parks local tennis league before June 12 ahead of the launch of the new season – more details at https://localtennisleagues.com/burnleyparks