Almost 50 pickleball courts coming to new Parkland multisport facility

• The new sportsplex in South Whitehall Township will have 47 indoor and outdoor pickleball courts, along with basketball and volleyball courts
• The pickleball part of the club will be called Pickleball Lehigh Valley and welcome all local players
• The facility likely will hold a grand opening in November

SOUTH WHITEHALL TWP., Pa. — Lehigh Valley residents for months have seen big signs along major highways with little information other than “Parkland Pickleball Club.”

The billboards refer to the 47 pickleball courts planned at a new "sportsplex" in South Whitehall Township, which is gearing up for a grand opening in the coming months.

“It's going to be a wonderful pickleball mecca,” said the facility’s Director of Pickleball Operations Mary Jo (Campbell) Cambridge.

Pickleball resembles badminton and tennis, but players use smaller courts, wooden paddles and perforated plastic balls.

The sport has grown dramatically in the past five years. Currently, about 8.9 million people across all age ranges play the game, according to USA Pickleball, the sport's national governing body in the United States.

The facility also will have basketball courts, volleyball courts, a gym, an exercise recovery area, a player’s lounge and an events center.

Courtesy

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Mary Jo Cambridge

The sportsplex will be at 4636 Crackersport Road, just west of Routes 22 and 309.

The location used to be the Westend Racquet Club, and there is currently a separate senior care facility called Parkland Manor on the property.

The Parkland area has recently had a boom of new pickleball courts, with new courts in North Whitehall and South Whitehall townships. Upper Macungie’s Grange Park had some of the first dedicated pickleball courts in the area, built in 2017.

Pickleball Lehigh Valley

The facility will have 25 indoor and 22 outdoor pickleball courts. Twelve of the indoor courts will be on hard courts and 13 on wooden ones.

The pickleball part of the club actually will be called Pickleball Lehigh Valley and welcome all local players, Cambridge said. The billboards were put up by property owner Abe Atiyeh and were meant to gauge interest in the sport, she said.

Organizers are negotiating a partnership agreement with one of the Lehigh Valley's major health networks.

Cambridge said the project has been in the works for about two years. The building still is under construction, with a grand opening expected in November.

But Cambridge has hosted some players on the finished courts over the past few weeks, starting during the heat wave in early September.

“I felt terrible," Cambridge said. "It was 100 degrees. And we had these 12 air-conditioned courts. So I invited the members of the community over at Grange [Park] and in the different parts of the valley to come try the courts.

"And they were hooked. The day they came in, they were so grateful to be out of the heat, and they had a great time.”

Cambridge, who went to Bethlehem Catholic High School, said she grew up playing tennis at the Westend Racquet Club before becoming a pickleball fanatic.

She said other local players have shared that experience.

“Every person that has walked in that is over the age of 50 has said, ‘Oh my gosh, I played here as a kid,’ or ‘My dad played tennis here as a kid.’ There's a lot of history there,” Campbell said.

“It's one of the nicest, biggest venues around. It's really remarkable. And we're going to breathe new life into it.”

Membership to the sportsplex will have a base price of $30 per month along with a separate charge for using the courts, which Cambridge said will be about $2.50 per hour and will change depending on the time of day.

Seniors will get a $10 discount on the base charge.

EDITOR'S NOTE: This report was updated to reflect that the name of the facility and its association with one of the region's health networks has yet to be finalized.