What pickleball courts cost: public bid examples

There is no official price for a pickleball court. USA Pickleball and the American Sports Builders Association publish construction guidance, not prices, and every public project is bid on its own drawings. What can be checked is what cities and park districts actually budgeted or awarded, because those numbers sit in public bid tabulations and council packets. This page collects twelve figures from eleven public documents, from line painting to a lit eight-court complex. Each figure covers the scope that document describes and nothing more. Read them as examples of what one jurisdiction paid in one year, not as a quote for your site.

Four kinds of court project

• Lining only: pickleball lines painted on an existing tennis or basketball court. Courts share space, and the original surface stays.
• Resurfacing: crack repair, new acrylic color coats and fresh lines on an existing hard court.
• Tennis conversion: a tennis court resurfaced and re-lined for pickleball, either as a dedicated pickleball court or as a shared (hybrid) court.
• New build: earthwork, base, pavement or concrete slab, surfacing, nets and usually fencing; sometimes lighting, shade, walks and parking.

What the layers of a court are, from subgrade to color coat, is covered in pickleball court surfaces.

New courts: awarded and estimated amounts

The per-court column is simple division of the amount by the number of courts. It includes everything else in that contract, so it is not the price of a court alone.

Evanston's figures are staff estimates, not bids. Its 2024 capital plan held $350,000; the memo puts the slope and soil work alone at $200,000–$250,000 for four courts and $400,000–$500,000 for six.

Conversions, resurfacing and lines

Los Angeles adds that crack repair or leveling costs extra, with no amount given. Ames' staff estimate for the whole job was $63,600, including $3,000 for pickleball line painting; the low bid came in at $72,900 with the alternate.

The range at a glance

1. Elmhurst Park District, IL, 2022: indoor resurfacing, $38,500 for 6 tennis courts.
2. Rosendale/Marbletown, NY, 2025: resurfacing, $21,000 for 2 pickleball courts.
3. Ames, IA, 2023: resurfacing with posts and nets, $71,500 for 4 tennis courts.
4. Los Angeles, CA, 2022: hybrid conversion, about $20,000 per tennis court.
5. Dublin, OH, 2020: $311,050 for 10 new courts with lighting.
6. Troy, MI, 2025: $489,509.82 for 8 new courts with shade structures.
7. Pasadena, CA, 2023: $147,777 for 2 temporary courts on rebuilt paving.
8. Fresno, CA, 2024: $854,126.40 for 8 courts with lighting.
9. Novi, MI, 2024: $1,116,150.75 for 8 courts plus 75 parking spaces.

Why the numbers are so far apart

1. Scope beyond the court. Novi's award includes 75 parking spaces; Troy's includes two shade structures; Dublin's includes walks and stormwater work. None of the documents separate a "court-only" price.
2. Lighting. In Dublin, the low bidder priced court lighting at $67,000, about a fifth of its $311,050 total. Fresno's eight courts include lighting; Pasadena's two do not.
3. Fencing and wind screens. Troy's bid covers 585 ft of 96-in chain link, 365 ft of 48-in chain link and 524 ft of wind screen; Novi lists 843 ft of 8-ft fence across its two parks.
4. The site and the base. Evanston's slope and soil work is $200,000–$250,000 of a $560,000 four-court estimate. Pasadena had to remove existing paving and part of a shade structure first. Resurfacing jobs reuse a base that is already there, which is why they cost a fraction of new builds.
5. More courts on one job. Dublin's alternate for two extra courts and fencing was $30,169 from the low bidder, against a $206,981 base bid for eight.
6. Region and year. The examples run from 2020 to 2025 and from California to New York, and each one reflects its own local bid market at the time.
7. Bidders disagree. On the same drawings, Fresno's five bids ran from $854,126.40 to $1,330,583; Pasadena's six from $147,777 to $266,000; Dublin's four from $311,050 to $525,600; Ames' two from $72,900 to $106,000.

Budget is more than the bid

Bids landed both above and below the estimates: Pasadena and Ames came in over, Dublin under. Duarte also added a 10% contingency to its award.

Checklist for reading a court cost figure

• Is it a bid, an award, an engineer's estimate or a budget line?
• How many courts, and are they pickleball courts or tennis courts?
• New build, conversion, resurfacing or lines only?
• Does it include fencing, lighting, shade, walks, parking or drainage?
• Does it include contingency, design and inspection, or only the contractor's price?
• What year was it bid, and where?
• How far apart were the other bids?

Planning the layout first? See court dimensions, the court space calculator and the line paint calculator for lining a shared court.