My initiative is designed for and delivered in London
Yes
I am 18 years of age or above, by the application deadline.
Yes
My organisation is a registered UK entity and has a London-based address.
Yes
My organisation is a non-profit (e.g. school, university, or local authority) — not a for-profit, which can only join as a partner.
Yes
If there is a for-profit organisation as a partner in my initiative, they work on a cost-recovery basis only.
Yes
My solution is implemented at scale, or if not, I have a clear business plan, a minimum viable solution (prototype, pilot, or proof of concept), evidence of access to a lease for the space you are leveraging, and evidence of work or impact in London within your coalition.
Yes
I am aware that, if I am submitting more than one application to a Challenge run by Ashoka and Go! London, only one of them is able to progress through the stages.
Yes
Are you an employee (and their children and grandchildren) of Ashoka or any of its respective affiliates and participating advertising and promotion agencies?
No
I have read and accepted the Challenge Terms & Conditions.
Yes
First Name
Purva
Last Name
Tavri
Pronouns
She/Her
Email address
I would like to receive notifications and updates about Go London!, Ashoka, Ashoka Changemakers, and other Ashoka opportunities.
1
Are you an Ashoka Fellow?
No
Are you applying from an organization founded by an Ashoka Fellow?
No
If you are applying from an organization founded by an Ashoka Fellow, please specify the name and organisation of the fellow below.
Lead Organisation Name
Selby Trust
Year that you started/ registered your organisation
1993
Initiative Title
Selby Active
My initiative is designed for and delivered in London
1
Website URL(s) or Social Media Handles
https://www.selbytrust.co.uk/
Initiative Stage
Scaling (You’re expanding impact to many new places or in many new ways)
Sectors/Themes: What topic does your project most directly relate to?
Development & Prosperity
Initiative Summary: Describe your initiative in one sentence
Selby Trust (a locally led charity) and Haringey Council are building Tottenham a complete new £120m village filled with opportunities in an area that has historically had few. With over 200 homes, a knowledge centre hosting over 200 impact maker workspaces, 13 classrooms for adults and children to learn and enrich their lives, health and hire spaces including a boxing club to keep young people active and engaged. Selby Urban Village is the new benchmark of community co-production. The missing piece of this puzzle is a new multi-use sports hall. For years, Bull Lane Playing Fields has remained dormant, but no more: we have secured budgets for all-weather pitches, exercise equipment and adventure play. However, what the local community has really been crying out for is a new accessible multi-use sports centre. London Marathon and The England and Wales Cricket Board are supporting us to work with grassroots sports and disability groups to develop the design to meet local needs, host disability sport, and bring back the world-famous Haringey Cricket College, which was a world-leading, inner-city route into first-class cricket. We now seek £100,000 funding towards design, project management, and community engagement to obtain full planning consent and become investment-ready.
The Problem: What problem are you helping to solve and who will benefit the most from your solution? How close are you to the problem and/or community impacted?
Bull Lane Playing Field (4.27ha) has been dormant for many years, because of the lack of safety and anti-social activities. Located within one of the 20% most deprived areas in England, the neighbourhood faces acute challenges: crime rates are 18% higher than the London average, 5th highest in London for youth violence, and 46% of Year 6 children are overweight or obese. People here live eight fewer years than if they were born in an average London community. The community is highly diverse, with 70% from BAME backgrounds and nearly one in five residents living with a disability, yet there is a lack of accessible, affordable, and inclusive sports infrastructure. Selby Trust has supported locals for over 30 years, running the current Selby Centre and delivering trusted programmes to almost 220,000 users annually and responding to community need. Our impact is measurable: we already engage over 1,000 young people a year, have trained 16 clubs 87% of participants report improved physical health, 57% improved mental health, and families consistently value Selby as a safe, inclusive space. However, demand significantly outstrips current provision. We run tired and non- compliant, but ever popular sport facilities. The Council sports needs assessments and our own Selby Active advisory group of local sports clubs demonstrate a significant lack of sport facilities in the area, and there are no cricket facilities nearby. There are significant barriers to participation, particularly for disabled people, women, young people, and low-income families. Conversations with disabled sport teams, highlighted that the biggest barrier was access to appropriate spaces easily accessible by personal transport. The area needs a step change that only community leadership can provide.
Your approach: How are you/ will you addressing the problem outlined above? How does your solution unlock or reimagine access to spaces for sport and physical activity? What role do landowners, local authorities, or other decision-making stakeholders play in your approach? We'd love to know about the origin of your idea, and what was your "aha" moment" that led you to take action?
The Selby Trust has worked hard to bring the team needed to the table. We have built deep relationships with local grassroots sport clubs, disability groups, and executives from Sport England, Tottenham Hotspur, Middlesex County Cricket Club, and the ECB. We are all committed together to make a new sports centre happen on the neglected Bull Lane playing fields. Our approach is to design access to sport from the ground up—inclusion, affordability, and community governance at the centre. Co-developed with Disability Action Haringey and disability sport clubs, the centre will have features designed with the lived experience of disability sport to prioritise the budget on what matters, and not on assumptions. We will include neurodiversity-friendly environments, inclusive signage, and ample storage. The hall will have dividable courts, multisport flooring, and will host affordable sport year-round, maximising reach, with a particular focus on cricket supported by the ECB. The need for a new multisport hall emerged through conversations with our Selby Active. Our “aha” moment for a cricket focus came when we discovered the incredible cricket history of our site. In the 1980’s and 1990’s, the Selby Centre was home to one of the most successful cricket academies in the world. Our site produced 15 black professional cricketers, other participants built a future in coaching, and countless others took new transferable skills into their future careers. The GLA are providing strategic advice. Outline planning permission is secured, match funding of £500,000 is in place, and we have commitments from others for more. The requested £100,000 will unlock design and full planning consent and make us investment-ready.
Collaboration with young people and the community: In what ways does your initiative engage young people and community members closest to the problem? What role do they play in building the solution you deliver?
Our initiative is built around the people closest to the problem—low-income families, women, disabled residents, and young people at risk—over 70% of whom come from ethnically diverse backgrounds including - Black African & Caribbean, Mixed, Asian and Eastern European. Many participants are eligible for free school meals, and we support around 50–60 young people each holiday through the Holiday Activities and Food (HAF) programme, ensuring access when need is highest. The existing Selby Sports Hall supports long-standing community groups—each averaging 20+ participants. Their sustained use has directly informed priorities for the new facility, including affordability, multipurpose spaces, and inclusive access. Decision-making is embedded through Selby Active, bringing together clubs across boxing, basketball, cricket, volleyball, football and badminton. Young people and community members contribute through open sessions, one-to-one conversations, surveys, and accessible design workshops. Their feedback has shaped initial designs, programming times, ensuring the centre works for real users. Young people have co-created our activity—shaping age-appropriate session structures, inclusive practice, and shaping out recording studio. Our Holiday Clubs, including provision for children with SEN, and are designed around family feedback and safeguarding expectations. Young people have directly influenced our activities from sport, crafts, music recording through to growing and nutrition. Parents and coaches report increased confidence, communication skills, friendships, and independence among participants, alongside improved behaviour and sustained engagement in activities such as boxing and after-school sport.
Potential for/Evidence of Impact: How do you imagine your initiative will make a difference in unlocking spaces for and access to physical activity and sport so far? If you have already implemented it, what difference have you made so far? What is the impact your initiative has had , and or what impact do you envision having in the future?
Our initiative unlocks access to physical activity by converting underused land into a sustainable, community-owned sports centre, building on 30 years of proven delivery. At its core is Selby Active, our sports partnership group (ages 5–25), bringing together local clubs, schools, and multi-sport groups. Through Selby Active, young people actively shape design, programming and access—ensuring the space reflects real community need. We already have evidence of impact at scale. Through 15 HAF and 7 Sport England-funded programmes, we have generated 6,468 participations from 1,391 unique young people, including 182 disabled/SEN users. Participants report improved confidence, wellbeing and sustained engagement in sport. Targeted pathways have enabled young people to progress into coaching, volunteering and formal training. Inclusion is embedded structurally. Design group—comprising disability organisations and SEN representatives—directly informs facility design and service models, while activities are being piloted on the current site. Partnerships with NHS physiotherapy (including on-site staff access schemes) and Haringey Sixth Form College’s SEN group further widen referral routes and supported participation. With the new Selby Centre and Sports Hall, we project a 65% increase in footfall and 50% growth in bookings. At full capacity, we anticipate 26,000 annual physical activity visits from over 5,000 unique participants, including residents from 200+ new homes. Long-term impact will be secured through a five-year programme with Middlesex Cricket and Tottenham Hotspur Foundation, governed by Selby Trust via Selby Active. Subsidised sessions, school block bookings and volunteer-for-membership pathways ensure affordability, scale and deep-rooted community ownership.
Innovation: What is different about your initiative compared to other solutions that are already out there? How is your approach original and innovative?
What makes our initiative innovative is that it tackles exclusion from sport at a structural level—by redesigning how space, governance, funding, and community voice work together—rather than treating inactivity as an individual behaviour problem. Our approach is rooted in the Selby Sports Strategy, which integrates six priorities into one delivery model: understanding lived community need, enabling behaviour change, increasing participation, investing in accessible facilities, supporting skills development, and strengthening long-term partnerships. Unlike traditional sports centres, this is a fully accessible, indoor cricket-led multi-sport facility designed as an exemplar for disability-inclusive sport and year-round community use. Inclusive design is embedded from the outset; this shifts the norm from “sports halls with adjustments” to spaces purpose-built for diverse bodies, cultures, and abilities. Innovation also lies in governance and accountability. Programmes are led through Selby Active, ensuring grassroots clubs and residents shape delivery. Impact is measured using the Selby Urban Village Social Value Framework, developed through a Theory of Change model, with disaggregated data on age, gender, ethnicity, disability, postcode, and free school meal eligibility—moving beyond headline participation numbers to evidence equity and depth of impact. We combine sport with environmental innovation. The centre is being delivered to BREEAM “Very Good” standards using cross-laminated timber, passive ventilation, and district energy—reducing running costs and making inclusion financially sustainable. Together, these elements reimagine underused land as a community-owned system - shifting power, access, and long-term outcomes in one of London’s most underserved areas.
Viability and Scalability: How are you setting your initiative up for success, and what is your plan to ensure operational sustainability of your solution and its impact? What are your ideas for scaling your initiative to the next level?
Our initiative is designed for long-term viability through secure tenure, phased delivery, diversified income, and accountable governance. We are negotiating a minimum 25-year lease for the Selby Centre and a longer-term tenure for the sports hall land. Delivery is phased and de-risked. Phase 1a (Selby Centre) has secured planning permission and procurement approval. Phase 1b (Sports Centre) has outline consent (24/03634/OUT), with detailed design progressing in collaboration with the London Marathon, the GLA and the ECB. Activities are already being piloted on-site, building demand ahead of capital delivery. Operational sustainability is underpinned by a blended model: facility hire by grassroots clubs, structured programmes, grant funding, health referrals (including NHS physiotherapy partnerships), and education links such as Haringey Sixth Form College’s SEN group. A co-design group of disability and SEN representatives directly informs inclusive facility design and service models, ensuring relevance and uptake. Impact is measured through the Selby Urban Village Social Value Framework, built on a Theory of Change model. Indicators include participation by age, gender, ethnicity, disability and postcode; FSM eligibility; weekly facility hires; and grant income secured. Targets include increasing participation among women, disabled residents and low-income households, improving health outcomes, and reducing anti-social behaviour through structured youth engagement. To scale, we will refine this model as a replicable template for underused urban sites—supported by strategic partners and evidence-led reporting. By 2028, we aim to increase our participation-based social value score from a baseline score of 77% to 93%, and partnership/fundraising from 84% to 88%.
Roles and Responsibilities: Describe how responsibilities are shared among your team or partners.
Selby Trust (Lead Delivery Partner & Community Anchor) Selby Trust is the lead client for Phase 1b (Sports Hall) and is responsible for overall project leadership, governance, fundraising coordination, and community engagement. Drawing on over 30 years of local delivery, Selby Trust convenes partners, leads the Selby Active network, ensures community voice is embedded at every stage, and safeguards the project’s social value, inclusivity, and long-term operational sustainability. Selby Trust will also oversee the design team appointment, Value Engineering discussions, and transition into delivery and operation. Haringey Council (Landowner & Strategic Partner) Haringey Council is the landowner and strategic regeneration partner within the £120m Selby Urban Village scheme. The Council provides planning leadership, client support, and alignment with borough-wide regeneration, health, and sport strategies. It is the lead client for Phases 1a and supports Phase 1b through planning coordination, technical input, and long-term estate integration. Design Team (Lead Consultant & Multi-disciplinary Specialists) The appointed architectural and multi-disciplinary design team will lead Stages A–D, including brief refinement, planning application, tender-ready design (RIBA 4.1 equivalent), and technical support through Design & Build procurement. Responsibilities include coordination of architecture, engineering, accessibility, sustainability, fire, transport, and cost management, ensuring design quality, affordability, inclusivity, and performance standards are protected throughout delivery. England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) (Technical Advisor) ECB provides specialist technical guidance to ensure the sports hall meets elite and grassroots indoor cricket performance standards, including ball-flight, run-ups, lighting, surfaces, and training requirements. ECB also supports quality assurance during design development and contractor review stages. Selby Active (Community Governance & Programme Partners) Selby Active—representing over 10 local clubs—acts as the community governance and delivery partner, shaping programming, access priorities, and operational policies. Members contribute lived insight, co-design input, and ongoing programme delivery across multiple sports, ensuring the facility responds to real community need. Together, these partners create a shared-responsibility model that combines technical excellence, public-sector leadership, and deep community ownership—critical to delivering an inclusive, sustainable, and high-impact sports facility.
Upcoming Milestones: Please provide an overview of the milestones that are required for your initiative to come to fruition/to grow.
Our initiative will progress through a phased and de-risked delivery pathway, aligned with the Selby Urban Village programme and the Sports Hall Design Invitation for Proposals. 2026 – Enabling & Planning Phase • Stage A: Brief Refinement & Concept Revisit (Feb–May 2026) Appointment of the design team; review of outline consent; refinement of the sports hall brief incorporating ECB, Middlesex Cricket, disability-sport standards, and Selby Active multi-sport requirements. Community, club, and disability-sport consultation workshops completed. Output: Updated design brief, inclusivity strategy, and revised spatial concepts. • Stage B: Full Planning Application (May–Sept 2026) Development of a full detailed planning application (or Reserved Matters if agreed), including coordinated design, sustainability, accessibility, fire, transport, and cost planning. Public engagement and planning authority consultation. Planning determination expected Autumn 2026. 2027 – Tender & Procurement Readiness • Stage C: Tender-Ready Design (Feb–July 2027) Design developed to RIBA Stage 4.1 equivalent, including full technical drawings, Employer’s Requirements, cost plan, and sports performance specifications. Output: Complete tender package for a single-stage Design & Build contractor. • Single-Stage D&B Tender (Summer 2027) Contractor procurement, evaluation, and selection. • Contract Award & Design Development (Autumn 2027) Pre-contract value engineering to confirm affordability while protecting inclusive and performance standards. 2028–2029 – Delivery & Opening • Start on Site: Spring 2028 • Construction & Fit-Out: 2028–early 2029 • Completion & Opening: April 2029 This staged approach ensures funding readiness, community-led design quality, and delivery certainty—creating a clear pathway from early-stage investment to a fully operational, inclusive sports facility with long-term community impact.
Capacity-Building Participation and Support Funding: If you were to make it as a finalist, you will be required to participate in an 8-week capacity building programme. If funding/ cost is a barrier to your participation, we may be able to offer up to 10,000 GBP of grant money available to support you. Please break down below, if it is the case, what costs you would incur and you would need covered. (Please note that there are restrictions on how the grant money may be used; please refer to the T&Cs for further details.
The Selby Trust will participate in the 8-week capacity building programme with a regeneration / Community engagement officer joining the sessions. We see real benefit in this opportunity to further build our network and learn from best practices. The £10,000 initial injection would allow us to complete Stage A of our delivery plan by supporting our design concept refinement (design and consultancy fees) as we co-design workshop/s with Disability Action Haringey and Selby Active. Our Match Funding currently secured must be phased across the delivery plan; without further support, such as from the Go London fund, we will not be able to proceed with delivering this much-needed project.
