A councillor says his town is being “left behind” after a centre for Britain’s fastest-growing sport was refused over fears about the noise players would make.
Cabinet members on Maidstone council have decided not to proceed with a request to create padel tennis courts at Coronation Square behind Lockmeadow.
The council had been approached by a private firm wanting to build and run three courts on the land owned by the local authority.
Cllr Stan Forecast, a back-bench Conservative, said: “The only explanation I heard was ‘potential harm to river insects’ as the reason for refusal.
“Yet that rather doubtful explanation was not backed up with any evidence from environmental reports.
“Padel is the fastest growing new sport in the world and Maidstone is being left behind with only two padel courts available within the borough – and they are both in Marden, whereas the Lawn Tennis Association advises that a town of our size should have 12 courts.”
But the leader of the council said the courts would have created too much noise for local residents.
Padel is a game of Mexican origin, usually played as a doubles match on an enclosed court slightly smaller than a doubles tennis court.
It has the same scoring system as tennis, but different rules, strokes, and techniques.
The balls are softer, and the bats are solid. Shots can be played off the court’s walls, similar to squash.
There is currently a separate planning application before the council from Natural Fitness Gym to build a padel court at the firm’s new centre on the 20/20 business park in Allington.
Cllr Forecast added: “There appears to be no technical reason why the cabinet has refused the Lockmeadow application.
“It’s immensely disappointing.
“Officers had seemed to support the venture in pre-app consultations with the applicants.
“I will be moving a motion at the July council meeting asking that the cabinet make a formal decision on the subject in public, giving its reasons, especially if the decision remains to be to refuse permission.”
Cllr Forecast said: ”If concern for the environment was the rationale, it seems to me that more harm will be done by forcing those wishing to play padel to travel to Tonbridge or Sevenoaks rather than playing in their own town centre.
“This is the fastest-growing sport in the world that would have made a tangible improvement to the county town of Kent as well as enhanced footfall at the council-owned Lockmeadow site.
“Padel provision is being actively expanded in neighbouring boroughs, why not here?”
However, a bid to introduce a new padel court to Tunbridge Wells is currently meeting opposition, with some objectors claiming that the noise of the padel ball hitting the court wall “sounds like a gun going off”.
Maidstone’s cabinet made their decision at what is called an “informal cabinet meeting” – one in which there are no public agenda papers, no public minutes issued and no admittance to the press or public.
The council’s own property team is said to have been in favour of the proposal, as a way of bringing an income to the area.
The site at Lockmeadow is within easy walking distance of both the town centre and Maidstone West railway station.
The proposal for three covered padel courts came from Pulse Padel.
Martin Smickler is a director of the Kings Hill-based company.
He said: “First of all, we did not randomly approach Maidstone council. We responded to a call for bids to further increase the footfall at the Lockmeadow site.
“The council’s advert specifically suggested that padel might be a suitable use for Coronation Square.”
He added: “To be informed that the Maidstone’s cabinet has decided not to proceed with the padel facility at Lockmeadow Entertainment Centre came as a shock and is highly disappointing.
“We have spent a considerable amount of time and energy working with the council over the last year and have redesigned, renegotiated and done whatever was needed to try to push this exciting project along.
“Now the local community has lost a social healthy lifestyle activity that would have brought the people together.
“We had produced a community engagement strategy that focused on youth, families, retirees and specialist groups.
“We were also planning to offer free sessions to schools and local charities.
“We were advised that one of the issues we were facing was that Coronation Square holds two large festivals annually; we offered to open our facility free of charge on festival days to further support these events.”
“Coronation Square is left empty much of the year, leaving the place feeling cold and depressing. Many have said that the area needs a lift in energy.
“Padel would have brought life to the area 365 days of the year and would have complemented the other entertainment spaces within Lockmeadow.
“We were prepared to fund and build a state-of-the-art leisure facility, as well as operate it. We would have paid a guaranteed rental income and profit share to the council.”
Mr Smickler said his firm had offered to pay the council an annual rent for the space of £35,000 a year, and to pay them 10% of any profits.
In its business plan, the firm estimated that the council’s profits share based on an 80% court occupancy would be between £20k and £25k per annum.
It seems highly unfair
The company was proposing to put up the entire £400,000 needed to construct the courts.
Mr Smickler works as the general manager and head coach at Sevenoaks Padel, based at Polhill Garden Centre, which is run by a different padel company.
He said: “I have seen first-hand exactly what this has brought to the Badgers Mount Community there.
“After just six months, the club already has more than 3,000 registered players in an area that is far less populated than Maidstone.
“And Sevenoaks District Council has just granted Sevenoaks Padel permission to build a vast six-court indoor padel facility on a green space in the former Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, when Maidstone was unable to agree to let us build three covered courts on hard-standing in the centre of town. It seems highly unfair.”
“I would like to know why this very poor decision has taken so long to reach, and why it seems to have been carried out secretly, and with no public process and taking no notice of the pre-planning application that has been carried out.”
Cllr Forecast said that he understood the need for “informal” cabinet meetings – perhaps because the previous Conservative administration also used to hold them – but he said that where the decisions were controversial, as this one was, the debate should be held in public with full transparency.
He said: “A lot of people in Maidstone wouldn’t even know they have just missed out on this opportunity.”
Stuart Jeffery (Green) is the leader of Maidstone council.
He said: “We are not against padel tennis. We would like to see padel in Maidstone. But this is the wrong place.
“We have ambitions to use Coronation Square for more events – it is the only paved open space close to the river.
“Also, padel is very noisy and would have been played all day and every day and well into the evening.
“We need to think of the disturbance this would cause to local residents, especially those just across the river in College Avenue.”
Cllr Jeffery was unaware of the advert that Mr Smickler referred to.
He said: “That must have been from several years ago, before the current administration. We have issued no such advert.”
The council was run by the Conservatives until May 2024 when, following elections, Cllr Jeffery took over as head of a combined Green, Independent and Lib Dem coalition.
The Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) has a set formula for deciding the need for padel tennis courts in any particular area.
It starts with the size of the population within a 20-minute drive. It argues that around 20% of those people, weighted slightly for age and profile, would say they would be interested in using a padel court if there were one handy, but that only 8% of those would actually convert to becoming members.
The LTA says the minimum number of playing members for a three-court facility to be viable is 750. For Maidstone, those figures are 318,00 population, leading to 50,000 interested and 4,000 becoming regular players.
The LTA said 4,000 players would support 12 courts, or four facilities of three courts each.
For an example of the cost of playing the sport, Sevenoaks Padel currently charges £24 for a doubles court for 60 minutes during the week. At weekends, you can hire a doubles court for 90 minutes for £39.
The advert that Mr Smickler referred to was issued by EIA Real Estate on behalf of the borough council.
It read: “As well as the two currently available ground floor units to let at Lockmeadow, the council is looking for other operators who might be able to increase the overall offer and appeal of Lockmeadow.
“For example, there is a large outdoor area, known as Coronation Square, which may be suitable for temporary or more permanent uses such as padel tennis, soft play and food and beverage.”
