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New lease of life for derelict London playing field

Lottery funding of £178,000 has helped volunteers save a derelict and unusable playing field in one of the most deprived wards in the country.

Four new football pitches and two cricket wickets have been provided at the Flanders Road Playing Field in the London Borough of Newham, along with a new irrigation system and fencing improvements.

The Bonny Downs Community Association highlighted the inadequacy of playing pitch provision for schools, sports clubs and community groups within the borough but they realised there was only so much volunteers could do.

So they enlisted the support of Sport England who made a grant from lottery funds towards total project costs of £244,432.

Partnership funding came from the London Borough of Newham (£22,832), the London Marathon Charitable Trust (£42,550) and the Bonny Downs Community Association (£1,000).

Now the previously under-used and inadequate playing field is a hive of activity again with a range of coaching, training and play schemes being developed by the Community Association’s sports development officer in partnership with local sports clubs, schools and the Borough of Newham.

Peter Laing of the Bonny Downs Community Association said they could not have done it without Sport England’s funding.

“There is still some way to go but when I look back and see where we were and what this place was like, we are now leaps and bounds ahead,” he said.

“The funding was vital to enable the project to establish itself to a point where it could be self financing. We now have the right equipment and the right expertise to take it forward and we couldn’t have done that without the funding Sport England gave us.”

Flanders Road factfile

To ensure the site is maintained to a high standard, additional funding has been provided to buy grounds maintenance equipment, to employ a groundsman and to enhance the management of the site.
A new ball guard has been erected to prevent disturbance and annoyance to local residents.
Essex County Cricket Board is involved in cricket coaching schemes at Flanders Road and hope to develop more young cricketers for the county squads.
Vicarage Primary School uses the field for their sports day.
A junior cricket club has been set up and is now run by the community.

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