53 Whitehaven Harbour Youth Project

Synthesis of the case study

The Whitehaven Harbour Youth club is an inclusive youth club for young people aged 7-25 and offers an array of outdoor, indoor, sporting and non-sporting activities. Whitehaven Marina is utilised to give young people an accessible place to access recreational water sports on their doorstep. Activities included on the marina are paddleboarding, canoeing, kayaking and beachcraft. The sessions have a cost associated with them, however this varies dependent on the sport. Incorporated into all of this work is education and awareness raising of the environmental impact that the residents can, and do, have on the quality of the water in the marina. The first key action of this was continuing to pursue the project after the initial funding ended, by keeping the momentum going, as Whitehaven as a community has had a lot of projects that start but never led to anything or are abandoned before completion. The second action was to make this project youth led and therefore owned by the young people, in order for them to understand what this could mean in the future. Ultimately, the project aims to transform the marina into a vibrant sporting and adventure venue to bring inspiring, healthy and positive activities to people in the local community.