After more than a decade of pushing, fundraising and making do, Netball Rodney Centre is finally playing on courts it can be proud of.
The upgraded courts at Wellsford's Centennial Park reopened a few weeks ago, marking the first stage of a long-running community effort to rebuild netball in the area. For Lynette Gubb, who has been on the Netball Rodney Centre committee since 1984, it's a moment more than forty years in the making.
"I've been involved in just about every one of the startup attempts to get this plan underway," Lynette says. "So, for me personally, to see these courts there now, it's been fantastic."
From disused tennis courts to a multi-use home
The new courts sit on the site of the old, surrendered tennis courts rather than Rodney's original netball courts, which a feasibility study confirmed couldn't be rebuilt where they stood because of risk of flooding. The tennis surface had been sitting unused and overgrown with moss, so the plan was to reorientate it, open it up as a shared multi-sport space, and give netball somewhere safe to play.
The old netball courts had become a genuine safety problem. "It became really unsafe," Lynette says. "The coating we'd put on actually trapped the water, so they'd go black and slippery, and grass was growing out of the cracks. Two of the middle courts we couldn't play on at all."
Auckland Council funded the full court rebuild through its Sport and Recreation Facilities Investment Fund. Four courts have been laid, with three open now; the fourth needs remedial work after calcium leached out of the retaining blocks during a very wet summer, and is expected to be ready next year. In the meantime, Rodney is running junior netball across two sites, Year 1 to 4 on the lower courts and Year 5 to 8 on the new upper courts.
A community opening
Council marked the milestone with an official opening, inviting the people who worked on the project alongside Netball Northern Zone.
"Every kid from Year 1 to 8 got a pair of bamboo netball socks, and every team got a ball," Lynette says. There was face painting, activities, and a team gathering community submissions for the wider park plan.
The ribbon cutting was a fittingly homegrown affair. "Our patron Jenny Hastie and I are both life members, so between the four of us, with a couple of younger kids, we cut the ribbon," Lynette laughs. "The scissors were blunt and didn't really work, but it all came together."
Built on volunteers
What makes the milestone sweeter is who got it there. Netball Rodney Centre runs on a single part time centre coordinator and a committee of volunteers, most of them juggling full time jobs and, as Lynette puts it, "a couple of hats or three hats" each.
For a long time the centre couldn't even fill its committee. That's finally changed. "The last two years we've had a full committee, and that helps a lot," Lynette says. "We can spread the load." After decades of the work falling on a handful of shoulders, having enough hands to share it is its own kind of win.
Turning the tide
The courts aren't just safer, they're a drawcard.
"We didn't have anything to push when our courts weren’t safe," she says. "Now we've got lovely courts that we can feel proud to host other clubs at. It's a morale thing, especially for our committee, we've finally got something we can be proud of."
The comeback is already stirring. Mahurangi is bringing teams up on Friday nights and Saturdays, and the centre is planning an invitation tournament for its representative players, the kind of event that was simply off the table before. With Mangawhai one of the centre's biggest and fastest growing clubs, better facilities in a growing catchment matter more than ever.
A park for everyone
Netball's win is part of a much bigger vision for Centennial Park. The redevelopment sits within a council greenways plan and is being driven by a collective of representatives from community groups and sport codes.
The plan spans seven sports, and the space is already earning its keep as a genuinely public, open facility, a basketball hoop, rollout tennis nets, and kids playing social netball and tennis on Monday nights. Tennis is regrouping, pickleball has shown interest, and athletics and rugby are part of the picture too.
"In a small community, we just have to work together and use the facilities to the max," Lynette says. "You can't really have a standalone netball court anymore unless you've got pots of money. You go down there now and there are people playing, that's the whole purpose."
Part of a bigger picture
Rodney's courts were identified as a top priority in the Auckland Region Netball Facility Plan, with four of six courts unplayable and serious health and safety risks flagged. Netball Northern Zone, through the Regional Facilities Working Group, has been advocating alongside Auckland Council and Aktive to get the four court project across the line with work supported early on by Karyne Ross from (Northern Zone) and Anita Coy-Macken of Visitor Solutions, who led the feasibility and concept design.
"Seeing Rodney's courts open is exactly what this work is about. It takes a real collective effort. Centres, Council, Aktive and our working group to get community netball facilities to a safe, playable standard, and Rodney shows what's possible when everyone pulls in the same direction." — Mary Gardiner, Board Chair, Netball Northern Zone and Regional Facilities Working Group.
The project is far from finished. Rodney is now at the design and consent stage, with $400,000 granted from Auckland Council and the collective being formally set up to help govern the project. Still to come are two covered courts and an indoor space, weather protection that would be a game changer for the netball centre's youngest players, and a step towards the six or seven courts the growing catchment needs.
Her why
For Lynette, it has always been about something bigger than the concrete. She describes more than four decades of service as her whakapapa with the club.
"My grandchildren are playing, and I've got a great granddaughter who'll be two this year. In a few years she'll be out there. That's my why," she says. "A lot of us still involved can't play anymore, but it's about giving back."
"To me it's onwards and upwards. We'll probably take a few steps back, but let's take two more steps forward each time."
Learn more about our Auckland Region Netball Facility Plan here
