Kingsbridge Project board member Amanda Smith tells us about their activities.

Kingsbridge Project is a consortium of locally based social entrepreneurs and community groups, aiming to restore a once vibrant recreational venue in South Birmingham. Our aim is to enhance the provision of sport and leisure activities for the benefit of a wide variety of local user groups, in an area where facilities are currently sorely lacking.

The Fields in Trust protection ensures that the Holders Lane site will now always be a public playing field and recreation ground. Improvements could be made in the future but only if they enhanced the area as a sports site. Whilst this is great news, Holder’s Lane still needs to have some investment to restore the pitches for those local groups who are desperate for competitive sports provision in South Birmingham. More people want to play but finding a suitable location for league teams remains very challenging.

Holders Lane Playing Fields is linked to Cannon Hill Park with various sports pitches including cricket pitches and a flood-lit, all-weather pitch. It runs alongside the River Rea with a Site of Special Scientific interest nearby and adjacent leisure gardens. It is surrounded by mature wooded areas.

Why are we so passionate about Holder’s Lane? The site allows ample room for competitive sports teams to play while also enabling those who value outdoor space for more leisurely recreation to have areas they need to be refreshed and renewed. Holder’s Lane has room for both.

There have been some painful decisions for Birmingham City Council recently with announced Cuts in Facilities. On 10^th December 2013 Sir Albert Bore promised immediate action in response to ideas put forward in the first ever Standing up for Birmingham public forum. Speaking after the event at the Library of Birmingham, Sir Albert said: “I am extremely grateful to those who gave up their time to engage with the financial challenges the city faces in the years ahead. I’ve been told that today’s meeting was very positive and people have already shared many ideas about how communities can come together to make an even bigger contribution to the city.”

Kingsbridge is a community project made up of committed local people with expertise, wanting to contribute to this area of the City. Our heartbeat is to help restore and manage facilities and enable the wonderful asset of Holders Lane fields to be used for the benefit of the community. With the challenges the Council face it is time to pool our talents and enable community facilities to still be used and enjoyed, managed and maintained…..anyone else up for the challenge and ready to join us?