Lisburn RFC - Community Space Improvements

Aim

To make our community space fully accessible, repair ceiling & flooring, enhance our energy efficiency with new windows, lighting & heating

Who are we?

Lisburn RFC are a community rugby club in Lisburn.  We field 3 x mens teams, 1 x ladies team, U12-U18 youth teams and a thriving mini rugby section.

Why are we crowdfunding?

We are seeking to make the inside of our community space fully accessible.  Currently one third of our indoor area is on a raised platform and inaccessible to those with mobility issues.

With another section of the area not usable due to the water damaged ceiling, we are also fundraising to rectify this and the floor area to ensure our whole facility is safe and accessible to rugby enthusiasts and other community organisations across Lisburn.

We also want to improve our energy efficiency by upgrading our single glazed windows and installing new lighting and heating in the area, allowing elderly and less mobile supporters the opportunity to watch our games from the comfort of our clubhouse on days of inclement weather.

How we’ll spend the money raised

We are seeking to raise £50,000 to undertake all of these vital improvements to our club.  Sport NI's Olympic Legacy Fund provides the club with a very unique opportunity to carry out all the works, with a pledge from the Olympic Legacy Fund of £32,500 towards our target.

The specific work your support will enable us to achieve includes:

Repairing our ceiling by installing counter battens and  two bulkheads to divide it in to two sections, then plastering the entire ceiling.

We will repair the damaged subflooring in the area and lay new planking once repairs are complete.

We'll upgrade our existing single glazing to new double glazed windows on our 11 existing window frames and panel the surrounding walls.

We'll remove the raised part of the social area and reconfigure the seating to make it fully accessible and provide pitch side views for those with mobility issues wishing to watch games from inside.  We'll install automatic doors to complete our accessibility objectives.

We will install new energy efficient LED lighting in the seating and bar area to include new ceiling and wall lights with additional emergency lighting to suit the new layout.

To complete our efficiency improvements we will install nine new radiators throughout the space, removing the existing, inefficient radiators currently in place.

Community impact

As the only rugby club in the Lisburn and Castlereagh City Council area, we have always viewed ourselves as having a key role to play within our wider community.

Our space is currently used regularly by a variety of different organisations such as a Mums and Toddler group, our local Cattle Club, the Lisburn Community Choir, a local football club, several summer schemes and a local church youth group, to name just a few.

We believe that by improving the accessibility of our community space we will encourage more groups, particularly those focussed on supporting those with mobility issues to make use of our facilities.

We are fortunate to be situated in a very accessible location immediately off both the M1 and A1, on the edge of Lisburn City.  Given that ease of access, we want to ensure that the quality of what we have to offer our community is second to none!

How you can play your part

We are asking for you as friends and family of Lisburn Rugby Club to donate to our cause.  To enable the Olympic Legacy Fund to make a donation, we have six weeks to raise our target from our crowd.  So timing is everything!

Our other ask is for you to share our project on your social media pages far and wide, and tell the world to get behind us! The more people we reach, the more support we will get.

We also have some great rewards for you to get your hands on!

Funding method

Keep what you raise – this project will receive all pledges made