Bob CollinsThis is what trouble — big trouble — looks like in Woodbury.
It’s a pickleball court in the city’s Shawnee Park. It also happens to be the largest pickleball site in the Midwest. It’s a game that can “mark the diff’rence between a gentlemen and a bum, with a capital ‘B,’ and that rhymes with ‘P’ and that stands for…” well, you know.
Pickleball, from what we can tell, is the shuffleboard of the generation. People who once might’ve played tennis, people who are not as young as they were when they did, have picked up pickleball.
It’s spreading like an invasive species…
In Woodbury, the pickleball controversy spilled into public view this week when neighbors complained the old-timers are making a racket, according to the Woodbury Bulletin.
The city, which has spent $4,000 on pickleball, has rejected the neighbors’ complaints, but told players to start using some tennis courts in other parks in the city. It’s not like anyone’s using them for tennis these days, anyway. Maybe that’ll keep the whippersnappers satisfied.
The Woodbury paper took a stand on the issue in an editorial this week:
The city has been deft in not turning pickleballers away at the Woodbury border. under no circumstances should players — many of whom are 65 and up — be discouraged from forming an activity that fosters health and positive social interaction.
Frankly, we should be happy our local courts give seniors that opportunity. It would be a disappointment if our community turned it back on them.
