Transforming Lives Through Sport: Partners Needed for London Bridge Fitness Hub

Team London Bridge have been funding activities at Marlborough Sports Gardens via our Building Bridges Fund.

Local Charity Bankside Open Spaces Trust to get London Bridge moving with £5 million sports garden revamp. Find out how your company can get involved.  

London Bridge businesses to boost community health and wellbeing  

Bankside Open Spaces Trust is looking for Founding Partners to support their redevelopment of much-loved local community sports facility Marlborough Sports Garden. This is an opportunity for your company to make a real difference to people’s lives in London Bridge. You’ll also, as a Founding Partner, benefit from a three-year programme of very attractive rights and benefits 

Marlborough Sports Garden is currently home to low cost and free sports provision for children and young people, including those with special educational needs or disabilities, and free activities for older adults. It’s also a hub for corporate sports with regular pitch hires, leagues and sports days.  

Every year around 55,000 people visit the garden, making it a vital tool for combatting high inactivity and obesity rates locally. Although many of us associate London Bridge and the surrounding areas with work, or fun, those living here face high living costs, low wages and a lack of green space (around 91% of homes are flats, with no private gardens). Southwark has the highest rate of childhood obesity at Year 6 of any local authority in England and half of all adults are overweight or obese.  

Bankside Open Spaces Trust’s ambitious plans at Marlborough Sports Garden will enable them to reach out to many more people, particularly those excluded from sport.  

A visual representation of the redevelopment plans for Marlborough Sports Garden, a valued local community sports facility.

For 25 years, the Trust has been protecting open spaces and helping people access nature, community activities and sport. The sustainable redevelopment of Marlborough Sports Garden is their biggest project yet. Starting in August 2025, Bankside Open Spaces Trust will transform the garden into a hub for community sport and wellbeing in London Bridge. Their goal is to grow visitor numbers to 75,000 and increase the number of people taking part in activities by at least 50%.  

By the end of the project, those living and working locally will benefit from state-of-the-art sports pitches, a new sustainably run 2-storey building with indoor facilities and outdoor fitness spaces and a new healthy café. The site will also become a green oasis with food growing plots, green walls and planters to help clean our air and cool the surrounding streets.  

To find out more about the scheme and becoming a Founding Partner, arrange a briefing with the Trust’s Marc Hope and discover how your company can have a real impact on the health of the local community while achieving your sustainability, ESG and CSR objectives.

To chat to Marc: 07799662187 / marc.hope@thewinningtape.com