EVER HEARD OF PICKLEBALL?

A Red-Hot Sport Leaves Some Folks With a Sour Taste
 

Pickleball Is a Craze in the Over-55 Set, But Foes Are Raising a Racket

George and Janet Dillard bought a home in SaddleBrooke, a 55-and-older community in Tucson, Ariz., where they hoped to meet neighbors with common interests and enjoy the tranquility of the desert and mountain setting. A fast-growing sport, pickleball is taking active-adult enclaves by storm. But two years ago, a trio of "pickleball" courts were opened about 100 feet from the Dillards' property. Their peaceful lives were disrupted, as was the harmony in SaddleBrooke. (More after the break) 

The sport's wood and graphite rackets and plastic balls meant "there was a constant banging" when the courts were in use, often from morning until evening, says Mr. Dillard, a former insurance executive. "We had to take action." Forget shrinking nest eggs or threats to Social Security. The hot topic in retirement communities today is pickleball. A fast-growing sport, pickleball is taking so-called active-adult enclaves by storm. Part badminton, part ping-pong and part tennis, pickleball doesn't put a lot of strain on aging joints, fans say. And with courts about a quarter the size of those used in tennis, it doesn't require players to cover much ground. It's "the most addictive sport I've ever played," says Jeff Shank, a 56-year-old retired businessman who logs about two hours a day with fellow pickleballers in The Villages, a large retirement community in central Florida. "It's like a drug." The appeal is lost on other retirees. They think the sport's noise (many describe a "ping" or "pop") and towel-snapping ethos (players "whoop it up" and "do a little trash talking," says David McCallum, son of one of the sport's inventors) have no place in their backyards. Tennis players, in particular, are up in arms. That's because as pickleball moves into communities with tight budgets or a dearth of vacant land, participants often make a grab for tennis courts. In some communities, the divisions have prompted heated meetings among property owners, calls for noise studies and even claims that pickleball is destroying property values. In SaddleBrooke, pickleball foes, citing a local noise ordinance, succeeded in stopping play on the three courts opened in 2008, after pickleball players raised about $22,000 to help defray the cost of building them. Another neighborhood in the community has since blocked plans to relocate the courts to its neck of the woods. Jim Morris, 68, that neighborhood's representative to the homeowners' association, says, "We didn't want [pickleball] within 400 feet of the nearest home." Pickleball itself is no spring chicken. Invented in 1965 by three men including Joel Pritchard, a congressman from Washington, the sport was named after the Pritchards' cocker spaniel, Pickles. For decades, the game was little known outside the Pacific Northwest. Today, the sport boasts an estimated 100,000 adult players, more than triple the number in 2003, and there are about 2,500 public courts, versus just 150 that year, according to the USA Pickleball Association. Del Webb, the country's largest builder of active-adult communities, had pickleball courts in fewer than one in five of its developments in 2006. Now, says Jacque Petroulakis, spokeswoman for parent company PulteGroup Inc., the figure is above 50%, and Del Webb incorporates pickleball into almost everything it builds. "It's the hottest craze sweeping our communities," she says. Hot also describes the tempers in some neighborhoods. Last spring, the homeowners' association in Beacon Woods—a 2,700-home community in Bayonet Point, Fla.—approved a request: adding pickleball lines to one of four tennis courts. The change "does not obstruct" tennis players from using the court, says Ann Bunting, president of the association. But that's not how tennis players see it. "They took the court without our consent," says Ignacio Rodriguez, 68, a Beacon Woods tennis player. Some two dozen tennis players, Ms. Bunting adds, signed a petition in protest. In Mission Royale, a 55-plus community in Casa Grande, Ariz., the local pickleball club is trying to secure courts of its own. Partly in response to noise complaints, the community's developer, Meritage Homes Corp., recently said it would be willing to spend "significant dollars" to relocate pickleball from a converted tennis court, says Jeff Grobstein, desert region president for Meritage. Ron Heymann, 65, whose home is about 100 feet from the existing courts, says he won't be sorry to see pickleball go. The noise from games—that of a "hard plastic ball thunk-thunking repetitively on a hard wooden paddle"—is "akin to a toothache that won't go away." Pickleball players in Mission Royale dispute such claims—for the most part. "There is a constant 'ping, ping,'" concedes John Grasso, 61, president of the local pickleball club. In March, Mr. Grasso says the club purchased a decibel meter from RadioShack. The findings: Tennis reached about 58 decibels while pickleball hit about 60. "There really was no difference. It's just a different sound." The difference was enough to evict the sport from its home in SaddleBrooke. Residents there, in 2008, first asked pickleball players to switch to a rubber ball to cut back on noise. Pickleball players passed. "Ask golfers to use a different kind of ball, and see what they say," says John Benter, 69, local pickleball president. A $4,500 noise study found that sounds from pickleball play were spiking above the county's 60-decibel limit, which applies to ongoing noise. As a result, the homeowners' association banned use of standard pickleball paddles and balls on the courts, effectively shutting down play. This spring, a proposal to relocate the community's pickleball courts near a softball field was abandoned after residents protested. "Nobody was throwing themselves in front of bulldozers—this is a retirement community," says Mr. Morris, the homeowners' association representative. "But we rallied our troops." The SaddleBrooke developer has since offered the pickleball club yet another piece of land. But players say the two-year battle has left them wondering if they will ever get a fair shake. Says Mr. Benter, the pickleball president, "Anyone who does not play pickleball now has anxiety about pickleball sounds."