The sound of paddles smacking against hollow, plastic balls and echoing off the walls was Saturday’s soundtrack at the Meridian Union Arena, as the Niagara-on-the-Lake Pickleball Club celebrated its 10th anniversary with a members-only tournament.
The milestone arrives, however, while the club’s outdoor courts remain closed and the town has no confirmed site for replacement facilities.
More than 80 members competed in the Tin Cup Pickleball Tournament across women’s, men’s and mixed divisions, marking a decade that saw the club’s formation and growth from a handful of players to roughly 575 members.
The Virgil Sports Park pickleball courts have been closed since the town ordered them shut for the 2026 outdoor season in February, and the Town of NOTL has yet to identify a permanent replacement site.
The town agreed in April to repay the club $13,748.17 for its share of noise-reduction panels installed when those courts reopened in 2024. A parks and recreation master plan review is expected to address future court locations, though no timeline has currently been set.
“The biggest challenge right now is just making sure that we have enough facilities to accommodate our members,” said Dragana Simao, the club’s board president.
Club membership peaked in 2024 with 740 members but Simao said the NOTL Pickleball Club capped the number of registrations it was accepting to protect playing time for existing members.
The indoor courts at the Central Community Centre on York Road, which opened in October 2023, remain available for public and club-reserved use. Outdoor options exist at Queenston Heights Park, where Niagara Parks Commission operates four courts, but town staff found no suitable park site within the preferred 200- to 500-metre residential buffer that would not displace existing sports fields.
Simao said a dedicated facility would allow the club to better serve its membership.
“In an ideal world, it would be amazing if we could get our own pickleball facility,” she said.
Vince Serratore, who has been with the club since it started 10 years ago, said the sport reshaped his health and social life after he arrived in Niagara-on-the-Lake knowing no one.
He said he lost about 60 pounds after taking up pickleball and said the connections he made through the club have stayed with him for a decade.
“Now if we had our outdoor courts open, it would be another story,” said Serratore. “But it’s nice that we can do an in-house tournament like this.”
The town and the club were each fined $1,000 in 2022 after a neighbouring resident took them to provincial court for a noise bylaw violation. The courts reopened in June 2024 after council amended the bylaw to exempt recreation on town-owned property.
The club was founded in 2016 and incorporated as a non-profit in 2017. Members come from across the region, with the majority living within the town, though the club also has players from St. Catharines and as far as Grimsby.
The parks and recreation master plan is expected to provide direction, but chief administrative officer Nick Ruller told council in April that no date has been set for the review to begin.
