A new heart for Brackenhall

Time for change: the current church and community centre

While the Chestnut Centre is impressive, there’s a need for a centre closer to the heart of Brackenhall. A second centre is now being built which will replace the existing Brackenhall church and community centre with a £2m, purpose built facility in a more central location on Holt Avenue.

Inside the new centre there will be a hall, café, church, meeting space, IT suite and changing rooms. Outside, there are plans for two football pitches and a multi-use games area.

The chair of the Brackenhall Community Trust, which is overseeing the development of the centre, is 79-year-old Joan Mallinson, who has been attending Brackenhall church since she was seven. ‘The current centre is full most days,’ she says. ‘There isn’t the space to develop it as we’d like.’

The current centre was built as a church in 1939. In the 1980s it was taken over by Kirklees Council to be run as a community centre, with the church retaining a small room to worship in. Joan is looking forward to the extra space the church will have in the new centre.

‘The church and the work we do there mean a lot to me,’ she says. ‘We’ve done a lot of work, particularly with young people. We’ve had a Boys’ Brigade since 1947 and it’s still running.’

Work on the Brackenhall Centre started in July and DBI is putting up 75 per cent of the funding. Joan was full of praise for the organisation. ‘Without their input it would never have got built,’ she says.

But she isn’t relying on DBI to make the project succeed, or on Fresh Horizons, which will manage the new centre. ‘It belongs to the community and it’s up to us as the community to see that it works,’ she says.