Tennis Canada, Rogers Communications, and Île-Bizard launched the fourth Year-Round Community Tennis Courts Program with a soil-turning event on Wednesday.
Tennis Canada, alongside Rogers created this program in 2022, with six municipalities who were selected to receive a total of $1.2 million in funding to develop covered tennis courts in 2024.
Spread across three provinces, they were each provided $200,000 in seed money, totaling $1.2 million in 2024.
14 projects have been completed and are currently ongoing so far.
“It was a pleasure to be in Île Bizard today for the second soil-turning event in the province of Quebec for our Year-Round Community Tennis Courts Program presented by Rogers,” said Eugène Lapierre, special advisor to the president, Tennis Canada.
The Year-Round Community Tennis Courts Program aims to provide access to over 20,000 residents who can play tennis 12 months a year.
According to a press release, the program has delivered 26 new covered courts, providing 4.1 million Canadians access to play tennis all year.
“Providing year-round access to tennis is at the heart of both Tennis Canada’s and Rogers’ objectives, and this new initiative is an additional step towards that goal,” said Lapierre.
In Île-Bizard, they’ve created six year-round courts and created an additional 600 court hours for players.
By the end of 2024, the program will build over 60 courts, which is more than 35 per cent of the program’s objective; reaching 160 courts in 30 facilities across Canada by 2029.
“The $5.6million Year-Round Community Tennis Courts Program, jointly funded by Tennis Canada and Rogers, will make year-round tennis a reality for Canadians across the country, increasing accessibility to the sport and helping to foster increased participation among youth,” reads the press release.
The program was created because Canada only had 750 public courts, representing one year-round court for every 50,000 people.
“We are proud to invest in the great work of Tennis Canada to make the sport of tennis more accessible all year round,” said Rogers Quebec Regional President Edith Cloutier. “Across different communities in Canada, and now in the district of Île-Bizard-Sainte-Genevieve, these indoor public courts will encourage young players and the next generation of high-level athletes to remain physically active.”
Rogers Sports and Media is CityNews Montreal’s parent company.
