Chiswick Rugby Club gets planning permission for Padel courts

Socialising at the rugby club’s outside event space

Turning the rugby club into a social hub

Chiswick Rugby Club has received planning permission to put in some Padel courts at its grounds in Dukes Meadows.

The club is planning to build the courts on an area of ground between the rugby pitch and the nearby hockey club. Currently there is a mound of earth which was dumped there when the all-weather pitch was installed, which has since grassed over. The club told LB Hounslow’s planning department there were no trees or hedges which would have to be removed in order to build the courts.

The club has recently opened up its grounds much more to the public, with food stalls selling burgers, pastries and coffees in the newly covered patio area outside the club house available to passing trade as well as rugby club members.

READ ALSO: Chiswick Rugby Club celebrates growing membership, new teams and new facilities

It has shed its exclusively blokish atmosphere and made itself much more attractive to young people and families.

International women’s rugby pioneer Alice D Cooper, with Lucy (L) and Hannah (R), from Kings College London Women’s team at the first women’s game at the club in October

In October they held their first women’s match, a long held ambition of the club’s which has been enabled by the provision of new changing rooms: six in all, so it is able to offer men’s and women’s facilities for a home and an away side at the same time, and two children’s changing rooms.

“It is stunning”, Rob Udwin, 2024/25 President of the RFU told The Chiswick Calendar at the launch. “When you compare it with what we used to have – a wooden shack and a muddy pitch. The change is incredible”.

Chiswick Rugby Club has offered use of the changing rooms to the Brentford Boat Club, which has just been given a 12 month lease on the site of the old Chiswick boathouse a few hundred yards away. They only moved in a month ago and the extent of their infrastructure so far is a couple of containers, a Portaloo and some boat racks.

READ ALSO: Brentford Boat Club finds new home in Dukes Meadows

READ ALSO: Survey of birds in Dukes Meadows in Chiswick finds 48 different species

The club’s Head of facilities and sporting development Andrew Lee hopes the Padel courts will encourage people of all ages to spend more time at the club, socialising and making friends.

They will start work soon on installing five courts, with containers adjacent for storage, a reception area and refreshment, floodlights, a seating area and cycle parking.

Design for the new Padel courts

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