Cléa and her comrades find their feelings again in a room that they really missed!
“We’re super happy, because we’ve been waiting for it for a long time. It’s a new room, it’s very clean!”
“The Saint-Ghislain room was under construction for a long time, so we had to go to smaller rooms. It was boring”
“The courts are bigger than in the other room we occupied, now we can play on an entire court with two people. It’s better”
After two years of closure, it is therefore also a relief for the president of the badminton club who had to find alternatives and less suitable rooms during these two years.
“Relief obviously, because we have been working for two years in conditions which are not very good. In addition we could not welcome the new registrants, now we can do it”, comments Régis Roland, president of the Saint-Ghislain badminton club
The sports arena reopens, even if the construction site is not completely finished. Roof, insulation, floor, heating, electricity, so many items completed. But there is still work to be done, such as access to the locker rooms, the cafeteria and the stands.
“On the one hand, we have a big project to complete on the pool side. And then, we still have a series of small finishing elements like the changing rooms or the ventilation ducts that we find in the machinery and which are not visible to the public”explains Kévin Posier, manager of RCS Saint-Ghislain Sports
Living alongside the work is a blessing in disguise!
“It’s not that it’s not serious, but it’s okay! We know where we come from. We played for two years with the young people in rooms that were not suitable for badminton, we had to tinker to have acceptable playing conditions so it’s less of a problem”smiles the president of the badminton club.
The city has decided to make the premises accessible before the end of the project to the entity’s two volleyball clubs, basketball club and badminton club. These sports associations lacked places to train. The Baudour and Hautrage sports halls are under renovation or construction.
“The situation was extremely difficult for our clubs. It was volunteers who were taking care of it and I had great fears that they would say we would never see the end of it. Thanks to the Autonomous Municipal Authority, thanks to the will of the City of Saint-Ghislain, here we are So, we are not in an ideal situation, we are well aware of that, but the room is functional and that allows us to move forward.comments Fabrice Fourmanoit, Alderman of Sports
Completion of the work is expected in the first half of 2025.
