Sport England

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London launches Active Places Power

New Planning Tool Set To Influence Where Future Sport And Leisure Facilities Are Built

Sport England has launched an exciting new planning tool called Active Places Power, which is set to influence where sport and leisure facilities are built in the future. The new web-based tool provides the most comprehensive dataset of sports facilities across the country. It has been designed to help local authorities and sports organisations to identify gaps in provision and form strategies for sports facility investment. This will be all the more important if London stages the 2012 Olympic Games, in order to plan for new athlete training venues around the country.

Lottery funded by Sport England and Big Lottery Fund, Active Places Power is being rolled out across the country over the next six months, with London and Yorkshire being the first regions to benefit.

Roger Draper, Chief Executive of Sport England said:
“At Sport England we want to create the best possible sporting infrastructure, so we can become a fitter and more successful sporting nation. Active Places Power will ensure that new sports facilities are built where they are most needed, by filling in the gaps on the sporting map.
“A more co-ordinated approach to planning sports facilities will be all the more important if London wins the race to stage the 2012 Olympics. A successful bid would see many areas of the country, benefit from the set up of new sports facilities to help athletes from nations around the world prepare for the Games. Active Places Power could play an important role in co-ordinating the best sites.”

Richard Caborn, Minister for Sport, said:
"In Game Plan, the Government's strategy for sport and physical activity, we highlighted the need for better knowledge of what we have in terms of facilities, making up the country's sporting infrastructure. Active Places Power will do this and more.
"Local councils and sports organisations will have access to a terrific planning tool which will highlight where there are gaps in facilities in our towns and cities. With this in place, councils won't need to carry out costly audits of what exists - they can just look at Active Places.”

Stephen Dunmore, Chief Executive of the Big Lottery Fund, said:
“The Big Lottery Fund has provided funding for thousands of sports facilities, both large and small, around the country. Active Places Power will be an invaluable tool, allowing users to access information and helping us all to make sensible decisions about future needs and how they might be met.”

Active Places Power builds on the recently launched activeplaces.com, which provides the public with an online directory of thousands of sports facilities that are already in use all over the country. The new system uses detailed analysis tools and census data to assess sports facility provision. It will become a valuable tool for those whose job is to supply more and better sports centres, gyms, indoor tennis courts and other facilities for our sporting future.

Chris Ruse, Principal Strategy and Funding Officer of London Borough of Wandsworth, said:
“Active Places Power will open up new horizons for anyone involved in planning sports facilities and services at the local level. Sport England have provided a powerful tool with which Local Authorities will be able to readily analyse sports provision in relation to the social and economic characteristics of their residents.

“By bringing all of this information together in a useable and practical way we will be able to identify gaps in provision, opportunities for developing sports services for priority areas and groups, and to make a stronger case for future investment.”

Active Places Power contains data on sports facilities along with other key demographic information such as age, sex, ethnic and socio- economic groups. Users can create thematic maps to display information or produce more detailed reports. It also has the ability to download data in order that users can use the information with their own computer software.

Active Places Power users will be able to use the website to carry out a stock take of sports facilities within their area, help inform decisions on planning applications, compare sports provision between different local authorities, use census data to examine the impact of new sports sites and carry out many other tasks that face planners and sports development workers.

Active Places Power will be available free of charge to local authorities and national governing bodies of sport.

For examples of how Active Places Power will be used, interview requests or images please contact Sarah Shore at Sport England on 020 7273 1590 or sarah.shore@sportengland.org
Active Places Power is available free of charge to public organisations. This includes decision makers from central government departments, non government departments, national governing bodies of sport, local authorities and lottery distributors (up to five users per organisation).
Visit www.activeplacespower.com to view a flash demonstration.

Active Places has been Lottery funded by Sport England who contributed £3.2m and Big Lottery Fund who contributed £2m. The Active Places system was developed by Landmark Government in partnership with RMSI. The data was provided by The Leisure Database Company and PMP. The Leisure Database Company has been contracted to maintain the data over a three-year period. Additional stakeholders supporting the project include: Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, Department for Culture media and Sport, Football Foundation, ONS, London Borough of Newham, London Borough of Wandsworth, Edinburgh University and the Amateur Swimming Association. New data analysis tools and other facility data will be added over the next year.

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