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Plans are in the works for an indoor pickleball facility to open in Mountain View, making it easier for local players to pick up a game and sharpen their skills.
The city’s zoning administrator approved plans for a single-court indoor facility at a public hearing last week that received broad support from the pickleball community. More than 50 letters were submitted ahead of the hearing, touting the benefits of pickleball while also pointing to limited capacity at existing public courts in Mountain View. Currently, the city offers just three dedicated courts and six shared courts outdoors at Rengstorff Park.
City officials have been looking to expand Mountain View’s pickleball offerings with additional public courts, but finding a location that’s acceptable to the community has proved to be a challenge.
Last year, a proposal to add pickleball courts at Cuesta Park or the adjacent annex prompted backlash from neighbors who were worried about noise and reduced green space. The city is now in “active negotiations” with a property owner to create an interim site elsewhere in the city, but the location has not yet been disclosed.
Separate from the city’s initiative, a private business owner is planning to open his own pickleball facility, which would let players rent space to play by the hour. Chris Robinson, of Ten Zero Sport, got approval last week to open his business in a vacant warehouse at 838 Independence Ave., which sits near the Palo Alto border.
“I’m just excited to get the court open and have people use it,” Robinson said at the March 11 hearing.
The facility will support public reservations and instructional coaching, making it the first court in Mountain View or Palo Alto that allows coaches to book times without having to join a club, Robinson wrote in a letter to the city. Local players could also book the court for a private game with friends.
The letter described the facility as a “quasi-public court” with paid rentals available through an online reservation system. The venue will be open from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. seven days a week and is expected to accommodate roughly four to six occupants at a time, including the manager. The majority of the time the court will be available for public open play with some recurring blocks set aside for private coaching, according to a schedule included in Robinson’s letter.
All but one of the 53 public comments submitted ahead of the public hearing supported the project, according to George Schroeder, the city’s planning manager. One letter however expressed concerns about the noise impacts. Schroeder noted that the court would be indoors and all windows and doors would be required to stay closed during playing times.
Robinson added that work has already been done to mitigate noise, including installing “sound deadening material” inside the building.
“It’s usually used in industrial spaces that are running machines,” Robinson said. “It’s almost imperceptible when you’re outside of the building. So as long as those doors are closed, I think we shouldn’t have any issues.”
Not only appealing to Mountain View players, the project also received the backing of Palo Alto residents, including David Siegel, president of the Palo Alto Pickleball Club board of directors.
Siegel urged the zoning administrator to approve the project, noting that the facility would free up public courts for casual and first-time players, which he described as the population most at risk of being shut out from the sport.
“I prefer to see expanded public court access where the benefits of the sport are available to everyone regardless of income, but municipalities face realistic constraints, financial, logistical and political, that the private sector simply does not,” Siegel said at the March 11 hearing. “The facility [Robinson] proposes will benefit not only its direct patrons but the broader Mountain View community by relieving the pressure on the overtaxed public courts.”
It is impressive that the owner is so conscientious of the noise impact.
But the city: Want to put pickleball in the middle of quiet, open space? No problem. Here’s the plan.