Welcome to Drenewydd Actif/Active Newtown, the heart of the Newtown community where sport, health, and wellbeing come together. Our mission is to create an inclusive and empowering space that supports the physical and mental health and wellbeing of our community.
Drenewydd Actif Newtown (DAN), previously Newtown Sports Club, has managed The Recreation Ground in Newtown for many years, providing grounds and facilities for the local Rugby, Cricket and Tennis Clubs. In recent years the clubs have been held back in their ambition to attract a more diverse range of players by the outdated 1970’s changing facilities, which only have communal showers and changing rooms – there’s minimal provision for mixed gender teams and none at all for those with accessibility needs. Also, the referee changing room does not provide separate spaces for male and female referees, who have to share changing and showering facilities. To address these issues, we plan to replace the outdated building with a new, inclusive and accessible, purpose built facility. But this project is not just about updating the changing rooms - we’re also planning a double height gym area, which will not only be available for the clubs but also deliver Olympic weightlifting, and personal training for disadvantaged young people, and an upper floor, served by an accessible lift, providing a large flexible open plan space for indoor sports and social activities, with a moveable partition, so that it can be broken down into smaller areas as required. This upper floor will meet the activity needs of the current clubs, with capacity for indoor cricket nets, soft ball and wheelchair tennis and a rugby training area that can be used in all weathers, so that they will no longer have to travel out of the area to access these. However, it will also be available for the whole community, providing an inclusive centre for sporting and social activities – the benefits of these for mental and physical wellbeing are well known! A survey carried out in April 2023 has shown that there is considerable local interest in and support for the project, with many suggestions for potential activities ranging from Pilates and yoga to archery and bowls, or simply knit and natter.
Brilliant initiative that incorporates a number of sporting events, teams and individuals. The Town needs something like this. Similar ventures have been very successful in other parts of Wales. All the very best. Pob lwc!
We are always on the lookout for spaces that are affordable that could be used for sports such as curling and dance workshops and where we could hold social events.
I think any kind of project that encourages people young and old to make healthy life style changes is a positive. I think it’s a wonderful idea
I look forward to the new facilities opening, I believe it will benefit the town and be of interest to the younger and older generation. I am particularly interested in joining yoga and pilates classes so I do hope these will be on the agenda.
In the early 1900s the Pryce-Jones family were the owners of The Recreational Ground in Newtown, which was managed and operated by the Royal Welsh Warehouse Recreational Society....
Together they played a significant role in the wellbeing and recreation of local communities and attracted participating organisations including Police from Manchester, Liverpool and Birmingham – the warehouse supplied their uniforms! - to the sports and music festivals in the town....
These events attracted up to 20,000 participants and visitors - a 1910 newspaper article stated that over 500 family members of warehouse staff from Llanidloes took the train from Llanidloes to Newtown, along with many more in their own vehicles or their bicycles, to take part in Newtown Sports & Music Festival or as spectators.
