Caboolture welcomes life-changing new PCYC fitness hub
Caboolture locals are finding fitness, friendship and a brighter future at the new purpose-built PCYC in the city’s centre.
The doors have swung open on PCYC’s new $17.5 million building in Caboolture, replacing the city’s ageing Toovey Street facility built in the early 1980s.
The new multi-purpose building has a 24/7 gym, multi-use youth space with a kitchenette, boxing rig and PlayStation 5 consoles, conference rooms, state-of-the-art gymnastics centre and outdoor sports courts.
The club offers free youth and sport programs for teenagers, cost-effective fitness classes for infants through to adults, gym memberships, and gymnastics classes.
“It’s really important that young people see investment in them, but also in who they can become,” says Heidi Senior, General Manager of PCYC Corporate Services.
Central to PCYC Caboolture’s new building, and mission, is the multi-purpose youth space used by Acting Sergeant George Swanson.
“We run free programs here for youth. Some are disadvantaged and don’t have any other option after-school. Their parents can’t afford it,” says A/Sergeant Swanson.
“ Some have said if they didn’t have PCYC they wouldn’t be active at all.”
More than 20 children aged 12 to 18 are attending afterschool boxing sessions, and dozens more attending drop-in basketball games.
“Boxing is an awesome skill for young people. It teaches them integrity, self-control, and to go beyond what they initially thought they could ever go,” says A/Sergeant Swanson.
The new kitchenette helps the club create a strong community by providing free dinners for youth that attend their sessions, funded by the club’s gym memberships.
“There’s a lot of wayward kids here who wouldn’t be where they are today if they didn’t have PCYC to come to,” says A/Sergeant Swanson.
New to PCYC’s offering in Caboolture is a 24/7 gym, conveniently located at the front of the building next to a bus stop.
“We have about 230 members, ranging from 12-year-olds to adults. With us only opening in early January, it really shows how much Caboolture needed a gym in the community,” says PCYC Caboolture Club Manager, Chelsea Evans.
At the opposite end of the building is a new gymnasium that sees 600 children learn gymnastics skills including traditional apparatus, balance beams, floors, bars, vaulting, tumbling, and trampolining.
“We run eight classes an hour, which is about 150 kids a night, six days a week,” says Maree Calder, State Sport & Recreation Manager for PCYC.
Classes cater to 4 to 16-year-olds, with older students progressing to become trained coaches accredited with Gymnastics Queensland.
“We love seeing some of our younger members who started with us as 5- or 6-year-olds come through the program. They volunteer with us, and when they reach 14, we can offer them paid employment,” says Maree.
The Queensland Government contributed $5 million to PCYC’s new building in Caboolture, delivered in partnership with the Federal Government and City of Moreton Bay Council.
“The new club gives us a really good base to expand our presence in Caboolture. I think there’s a lot of opportunity for more kids to come and take part,” says Heidi Senior.
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