Football in the Community
A subsidiary of Poppleton Community Trust (Registered charity No.523984)
Poppleton JFC Community Sports Pavilion Project
The Most Reverend & Right Honourable Dr. John Sentamu, Archbishop of York, was on hand to celebrate the official opening of our new state-of-the-art sports complex. The grand unveiling of the site took place at 2pm on Saturday 10th September 2011 at Poppleton Community Sports Pavilion, Millfield Lane.
Originally the club utilised two green portakabins which lasted for a number of years but eventually they gave way to the elements and the dream to build our own permanent clubhouse began.
The project started many years ago and with the help of our dedicated un-paid volunteers who included Carol Newman, Val Duggan, Mike & Mel Walshaw, Don Smith, Jess & Neil Fairclough, Jim Ferguson, Michelle Neryd, Neil Blondrage, Jon Dunning, Phil Richardson, Helen Crompton, Stuart Armstrong together with many others, all the planning and fundraising efforts which included sportsmans' dinners, bag packing, car washing and truck pulls, helped to make that dream a reality.
After many many meetings the applications for the planning permission and the funding were submitted to the appropriate bodies and when all was approved the first shovel of earth was dug by York City manager Gary Mills in November 2010.
It was a day that the club had worked very hard for - The building work had begun!
The new facilities include a four-changing room clubhouse with meeting and training areas, as well as official’s changing rooms and catering facilities. The project will benefit in excess of 350 players and the 25 teams who play at our club.
The project was funded with the help of a £225,000 grant from the Football Foundation. Funded by the Premier League, The FA, and the Government via Sport England, the Football Foundation is the nation’s largest sports charity. Since it was launched in 2000, the Foundation has awarded around 8,000 grants worth more than £420m towards improving grassroots sport, which it has used to attract additional partnership funding of over £520m.
An additional grant of £150,000 came from The FA, as part of their capital allocation within the 'Whole Sport Plan' agreed with Sport England. This specific aspect of funding has been awarded to support the sustainability of community clubs and create more opportunities to participate in sport within a high quality environment.
We already had great pitches at Poppleton that are expertly maintained by our multi award winning groundsman Jim Ferguson and this was an opportunity to add to the facilities for our young footballers to enjoy. Furthermore the community sports pavilion is also being used by non-footballers through the clubs' link with The Poppleton Centre and because we are part of a registered charity, The Poppleton Community Trust.
Val Duggan, Club Secretary at Poppleton JFC, said: “These new facilities are the culmination of a lot of hard work over the past three years by a lot of dedicated and enthusiastic people. On behalf of everyone associated with Poppleton JFC, I would like to extend my thanks to the Football Foundation and all our funders who have made this dream a reality.”
Paul Thorogood, Chief Executive of the Football Foundation, said: “We are delighted that Poppleton JFC and the local community will have access to these fantastic new facilities and commend the club and the North Riding County FA for their hard work in making this happen.”
The clubhouse was recently featured by the Football Foundation as an example of just what can be achieved when a dedicated bunch of people get together for the benefit of their local community. You can watch a short film of the club here.
The community sports pavilion is now in full use every week with the main room being used for Birthday Parties, Pilates, Baby Ballet, Cake Decorating classes and its also hired out to local companies for 'out of office' training days and meetings.
At weekends the football club comes to life and as our footballers learn new skills there is always a hot mug of tea and a bacon butty available from our Cafe for our equally dedicated parents to enjoy.
Many hours of planning and preparation went into this project and with the help and assistance of City of York Council, The FA, the Football Foundation, North Riding County FA, Poppleton Community Trust, the Parish Councils of Upper and Nether Poppleton, the imaginitive design of Paul Butler from Paul Butler Architects Ltd and local Poppleton based builders JM Butler Ltd who organised the build, the Community Sports Pavilion was completed on time and within budget.
Wind Turbine Project
Since October 2011 you can't help but notice our shiny new wind turbine spinning gracefully at the far end of our ground.
The wind turbine was part funded by a £15,000 grant under the Community Sustainable Energy Programme - Capital Grants Scheme (Big Lottery Fund).
The wind turbine generates electricity that not only helps to power our new sports pavilion but also feeds in to the National Grid to provide energy to the rest of the United Kingdom. All surplus energy that is fed into the National Grid benefits our club as we are then paid an income for each Kilowatt Hour (KWh) of energy that the wind turbine produces.
You can see more details about the energy that the turbine produces on a viewing screen inside the entrance foyer at the sports pavilion.
You can also see more details below on just how much energy our Wind Turbine has produced. The reimbursement is the amount in £'s that we have earnt so far for the surplus energy we have generated and fed into the National Grid. You can also see how much CO2 has been avoided by producing this energy from a renewable source.
