FOSTERING COLLABORATION

IAKS hosted its UK and Ireland conference in Cardiff in April. Stephen Bromberg, from IAKS and Lee Valley Regional Park Authority, reports from the event, where one of the main topics was the strong need to strengthen the collaboration between health and leisure sectors

The International Association for Sports and Leisure Facilities (IAKS) held its UK and Ireland Conference at the Principality Stadium in Cardiff in April. The two-day event, titled ‘Active Wellbeing in Communities’, attracted more than 100 industry professionals to explore how sports and leisure facilities can better serve communities.

Among the examples discussed was how a unique piece of Welsh legislation is influencing health and leisure, and how learnings from this can be applied in other countries.

From local to global

Shaun Dawson, CEO of Lee Valley Regional Park Authority in London, opened the event, pointing out how it had a “special Welsh perspective and a strong international flavour.” This was expanded on by moderator, Joanne Martin of My Leisure Consultants, who said: “Wales is the only nation to embed in law the need to safeguard future generations through the Future Generations Act.”

Keynote speaker Derek Walker, the Commissioner for the Welsh Government for the Future Generations Act, then set out how the legislation embeds long-term thinking into public policy and how Wales must “do the now and tomorrow at the same time”.

“Improving health, wellbeing, active travel and eco-literacy are among the many challenges that the legislation is tackling,” Walker said. “Sport and leisure need to be more integrated into all policy areas.”

Assistant Director at Sports Wales, Owen Hathway, followed by explaining how Sport Wales’ targeted investment creates impacts beyond sport itself and” leads to health, social, community and environmental benefits”.

Beyond leisure centres

During the day, delegates heard several practical examples on how sport and leisure were contributing to overall health and wellbeing. Lucy Donovan, Development Officer of Newport Live’s “Positive Futures” programme, outlined how the charitable trust’s outreach work had been a huge success in one of the most challenging areas of the country.

“We’re looking across generations of people with no work, where there is poor mental health and often a lack of trust in mainstream services,” Donovan said.

“We use sport to engage marginalized young people and that activity spaces should be looked at differently –carparks as well as community spaces, pitches and sports halls can all be used.

“New sports venues can be off-putting to many people, but with enlightened thinking they can be real community hubs with crime prevention, youth justice, social workers, psychologists and outreach under the same roof.”

Designing the right facility

Day two focused on how the leisure sector is uniquely positioned to create opportunities for communities to lead more active lives – as long as it realises how the right facility mix, solid business plans and effective operations all play a role in achieving meaningful outcomes.

According to Paul Cluett, Managing Director at Alliance Leisure, the industry needs to better understand the social value of facilities. “We’ve found that we need to sit with both users and – crucially – non-users,” he said.

He added that understanding the end-users is vital to remove barriers to activity, using a recent Alliance Leisure project at Clay Cross as an example. “Clay Cross has clinics and community advice services as well as leisure facilities under one roof,” he said. “I hope that in the future we’ll be building wellness centres, rather than sports centres.”

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Spaces for self-organised sports

The topic of listening to users (and non-users) in the communities that facilities service was further developed by Lisa Mari Watson, Managing Director from Tverga in Norway, who outlined her organisation’s approach to this.

“We believe that smarter solutions come from involving the people that they are meant for,” she said. “The more you understand what communities want, the more likely you are to hit the target of what you create. When it comes to facilities, multi-use is much better than single-purpose. Involve users early.

“I would challenge everyone to get in touch with user groups that they don’t see in their facilities. It’s important to dare to think outside of the box.”

Stephen Dietz-Hodgson of Danish architects, JAJA, then served up another practical example of innovative space design, presenting how the practice had incorporated unstructured activity into a car park by providing “staircase running tracks” and cross fit opportunities on the roof. He also showed a separate project, the transformation of a redundant industrial building into a Streetmekka – a place for street art and street sports which “breaks down traditional ideas of sport and creates new ways of engaging”.

Steve Ward, CEO of Newport Live, reminded delegates how community facilities should also keep in mind that nearly all users seek a positive health and wellbeing impact, rather than an elite performance outcome. “Our facilities are not for high end sport, but for local communities,” he said, strengthening the message by outlining how 99% of daily users at the Newport International Sports Village (NISV) were there to improve their health, rather than perfomance levels.

As a result, the NISV has been designed with flexibility of use in mind, with the village’s velodrome alone able to accommodate 19 different activities – the bulk of which can happen while cycling training is in progress.

He also revealed how Newport Live was utilising AI to map user activity and assist the design of new venues. “As we want people to not only live longer but to livein better health too, make sure you design things in and not out”, he said. “There is enormous social value to combatting loneliness and bringing people together. Re-engineer sports venues to be for wellness and for people’s whole lives. Single sports facilities are the enemy.”

When it comes to facilities, multi-use is much better than single-purpose. Involve users early

On the topic of removing barriers for everyone, Eoin O’Brien and Barry Dempsey from Rathdown County Council in Ireland said that sports clubs often “dictate” how resources are used. This, they said, can sometimes lead to excluding certain user groups – such as young people who merely want a place to hang out, or older people who may just need a level footpath to stay active. “We are now creating many more multi-use facilities and removing physical fences and other barriers.”

Empowering populations

The educational sessions were then brought to a close by a fascinating insight into how Uppsala, Sweden’s fourth largest city, has enabled a quarter of its population to be involved in sports clubs and make cycling a way of life. While this may sound like every public health professional’s dream,

Charlotta Karlsson from Sport Uppsala explained that clubs are mainly driven by competitive objectives which don’t necessarily embrace people who, for example, take up sport later.

Mikael Johansson from the city council also shared how the local authority had created a year-round activity zone from an area that previously hosted only winter sports, as part of a “long, linear park”.

“We removed barriers by building support from residents and politicians and tried small scale initiatives first, with low threshold activities,” he explained. “We also have a ‘leisure library’, which lends out free sports equipment to help those who might not own any.”

As well as the educational sessions, the two-day event included a workshop, extensive networking opportunities and tours of the Principality Stadium and the nearby National Sports Centre.

A spokesperson for IAKS said: “We would like to extend a huge thank you to the seven event sponsors, 15 speakers and moderator Joanne Martin. Special thanks to Mike Lawless, Elizabeth Adams and Charlotte King from LA Architects for putting the event together and leading some unforgettable Welsh singing.”