what are my options to rent an indoor gym for basketball in Richmond Hill, Ontario?

November 19, 2010 3:58 PM

What are my options to rent an indoor gym for basketball in Richmond Hill, Ontario? 10 university students who work and live in the area. The community center offers a relatively high rate by the hour so were wondering where else we could consider renting a basketball gym in and around Richmond Hill.
posted by in.betweener to health & fitness (5 answers total)

Try looking at some of the larger churches - unfortunately I don't remember the details since it was some years ago, but I've been to community meetings in the city that were definitely in church gyms.

Also, try a smaller community centre - again this is older info, but the rental rates in past depended on the classification of the community centre.
posted by scrute at 4:13 PM on November 19, 2010

This might not be applicable to Toronto (though it is for Calgary) and I simply bring it up because you're probably unaware (I certainly was most definitely surprised). In Calgary I play sports with the Calgary Sport & Social Club (CSSC), Toronto has their own equivalent version (Toronto Sport & Social Club - TSSC). I'm not suggesting you join the TSSC, but simply letting you know that if it's anything like Calgary then the TSSC would play a lot of their intramurals in schools (normally elementary or Jr High Schools, not too often at Senior High Schools).

If you could figure out the proper person to contact, you could ask them if they rent out certain school's gymnasiums and for how much. (If you can't figure that out you could probably email the TSSC and ask who you would contact to go about renting a school's gym and other pertinent details).

To give you a ballpark idea the costs to rent a small-ish (but still more than enough for 5-on-5 basketball) gymnasium in Calgary is about...

$65 / night for 2 hours for 9 weeks
$130 / night for 4 hours for 9 weeks
$130 / night for 3 hours for 10 weeks

That's just the first 3 I took a look at for school permits (it's also for volleyball and not basketball, but basketball you'd be playing at a very similar gymnasium). You probably could rent for shorter time periods than the 9 / 10 week intramural season (though who knows). Also, talking to a school caretaker, I do know that they'll rent schools here in Calgary out to just regular people like yourself (he was telling me about a group of 10-12 guys who have been playing for years and years, like once a week on a specific day... I believe for basketball but maybe for floor hockey). If you're able to, I suppose the added benefit is that you might be able to choose a school that's very convenient for you.
posted by calgary at 4:41 PM on November 19, 2010

The TDSB rents school gyms for something like $10 an hour. That'd be south of Richmond Hill, obviously, but York Region probably has similar rates.
posted by jacquilynne at 5:32 PM on November 19, 2010

Here is the relevant TDSB page with contact info for permits. You might not have a ton of flexibility as far as available slots this late in the school year, but it's worth contacting them to see what's open.

Anyone in Ontario should know that around 7-8 years ago the Ontario government directed schools to make their facilities readily available for community use. The high school I work at has activities going on Mon-Friday from 3:30 to 9:30 every night. They have to keep fees to a bare minimum - they are not allowed to use rental fees as a profit center.
posted by davey_darling at 8:41 PM on November 19, 2010 [1 favorite]

York Region School Permits. Here is the relevant PDF with rates for renting various facilities.
posted by emeiji at 12:03 AM on November 20, 2010 [1 favorite]