Facility
A Youth and Community Center Breathes New Life Into the Neighborhood.
The focal point of the 14-acre site plan for the Youth & Community Center will be the first-of-its-kind Golf Learning Grounds. Featuring movable tee boxes and holes, this clever design will allow for easy reconfiguration of the “course” and optimal flexibility of the land. In addition, there will be a Practice Range, Short Game Area, and a 4,000-square-foot PGA REACH Academy with Indoor Golf Simulators.
Also included: a Multi-Purpose Field, Batting Cages, Walking & Workout Trail, a Frisbee Golf Course, a community garden and indoor spaces dedicated to STEM education, and more.
Once complete, BGCSTL will own and operate the facility while local PGA coaches will provide golf instruction.
Also on premise: Best Buy Teen Tech Center with its free access to high-end technology, a makerspace, along with instruction and support on music and video production, web design, and college and career prep.
Together, these facilities in the JeffVanderLou neighborhood will provide a safe environment and a diverse range of opportunities for St. Louis residents of all ages to learn and grow.
Growing Golf in the City.
The Youth & Community Center would complement other local efforts and drive participation at existing courses in the St. Louis Metropolitan area and beyond. In addition, this project would bring Urban Golf of Greater St. Louis and other youth-serving golf organizations into the fold.
Adding More Greens to the Brickline Greenway.
The Youth & Community Center is adjacent to the new Brickline Greenway, an ambitious project building 20 miles of walkable and bikeable paths connecting JeffVanderLou with other neighborhoods throughout the city.
Restoring the Neighborhood’s Identity.
When Sportsmans Park was home to the St. Louis Browns and St. Louis Cardinals, games played there entertained and captured the imagination of patrons throughout the city. Across the street, the Carter Carburetor factory provided jobs to people in the neighborhood and beyond.
Together, they represented opportunity and prosperity for the people living nearby and gave the JeffVanderLou an identity.
The proposed Youth & Community Center will be built on this former EPA Super Fund site. After a seven-year, $38 million clean-up effort with federal support, the land is ready for redevelopment.
It will join ambitious redevelopment projects in the area like the Brickline Greenway and the new National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) campus to create opportunities that will benefit the residents of North St. Louis for generations to come.
The project will bring construction jobs to the area, in addition to ongoing full-time opportunities for staffing, and part-time work for kids.