Collingwood All Stars needs a new stadium

The proposal:

• To develop a three court sports centre at Collingwood College in conjunction with the redevelopment of the performing arts centre and provision of other community facilities.
  The sports centre will provide a new home for the Collingwood Basketball Association (Collingwood Basketball), as well as a range of other sports opportunities for Yarra residents.

Background information:

A preliminary business case has been prepared that supports this development. The project is estimated to provide 200,000 visits annually.

Why this development is required:

• There is an increasing school and resident population and unmet demand for indoor sport in Yarra, as well as a trend towards more indoor sport. Some 8500 people in Yarra alone are likely to want to play an indoor sport. 
• Yarra does not have an indoor courts sports facility. There is an overall shortage of indoor sports courts in Yarra and the surrounding cities of Melbourne, Darebin and Moonee Valley.
• Collingwood Basketball membership has grown by 60% in the last four years. There are approximately 1000 players registered and the club is at risk of no longer being able to meet player demand.
• Collingwood Basketball runs specific programs to ensure that players residing in Yarra public housing have access to their programs. One of the biggest challenges for involving these players is transport to games and training. A  venue in an accessible location like Collingwood College would make a huge difference to the viability of keeping these players involved.
• Collingwood Basketball's vision is to provide a full pathway of basketball opportunities from development and culturally based programs, venue based competitions for local public housing residents and young people living with a disability, and a full suite of domestic, representative and Big V competitions.  It currently has to hire 8 separate venues to run its programs.
• Collingwood Basketball works hard to ensure basketball is accessible to all young people living in the local area. Our membership reflects the inner-north's social and cultural diversity.
• A three court stadium is needed to:

- provide for future population growth in the inner city
- ensure venue based sports competitions are accessible to all young people in Yarra
- enable the Collingwood Basketball Association to stay in the heart of Collingwood and cost-effectively run a full array of basketball competitions and programs.

Why Collingwood College?   

• The Collingwood College gymnasium has been the home of the Collingwood Basketball Association since the 1970s.  This facility is reaching the end of its functional life and is now far too small to accommodate core activities.
• The demand for indoor sport is so great in Yarra that a single facility will not be able to meet current or future demand for basketball or other sports such netball, futsal, indoor hockey badminton and volleyball.

To see the complete preliminary business case document (pdf) click here