Intermountain (Colorado) takes a stand against pickleball lines on tennis courts

Pickleball has been growing in popularity the last few years, and at some facilities, pickleball gets played on tennis courts, sometimes with temporary lines, but some courts have painted lines for pickleball.  There does not appear to be a standard for how/where these lines are placed, some are a single pickleball court using the same net position as the tennis court, while perhaps more common is to have two or even four pickleball courts perpendicular to the tennis court.

Regardless of how the pickleball court is laid out, the lines can't perfectly align with the lines for tennis, and are often offset in some way, meaning there is an introduction of radically different lines on the court.  Depending on the color and width of the lines, these can be a minor to significant distraction to tennis players when judging if a ball will go in or not or in calling lines.

Here are some examples.

Just laying a single pickleball court on a tennis court.

We see the the pickleball baseline and tennis service line are close to each other which can make calling serves hard, but this is not the way it is commonly done as it only gets one pickleball court and there is lots of unused space.

There are lots of ways to get more pickleball courts placed, I won't go through them all but this gets two.

If the no volley zone line aligns with the service line, this isn't terribly confusing, but I also show how different colors can look.

But I think it is common to try to get four courts placed, which can look like this.

I've shown different orientations and colors, and I wouldn't expect this variation to show up on a single tennis court, but you can see how the lines look for each option.  This can get quite confusing.

As a result of what I'm sure many tennis players have issue with, the Colorado district in Intermountain has apparently introduced a rule requiring the home team to provide courts without pickleball lines.  If they can't do so, the visiting team is entitled to take a default win.  Here is the full text.

5.02A Match(es) Played on Unapproved Courts. If a home team is unable to provide the minimum number of required courts (See 4.02) without pickleball lines, the visiting team may refuse to play on the unapproved court(s) and claim a win by default for the impacted line(s).  If the players agree to play on an unapproved court, the points played will stand.

This is the first I've heard of a USTA League instituting a rule like this.  Is anyone aware of a rule like this elsewhere?  If you are from Colorado, what do you think of the rule?

What is interesting is that the USTA appears to have made a suggestion for pickleball to use the lines that some tennis courts already have for the smaller 60 foot court used for new players and juniors.  Tennis players are probably familiar with these lines as courts used for teaching often have them.

The blue lines show the normal 60 foot baseline and sidelines, but show the addition of a line seven feet from the net for the pickleball no volley zone.  The idea is that this is a small change to tennis courts that already have 60 foot court lines or would be adding them for junior tennis or lessons.

The result is a "pickleball" court that is 42 feet from baseline to baseline (using the tennis service line as the baseline) and 21 feet wide (the width of a 60 foot tennis court), which is very close to pickleball's 44x20 court dimension.  Apparently USA Pickleball is ok with this 42x21 court being used for recreational pickleball.  I'm pretty sure a sanctioned tournament couldn't be played on this court and I doubt pickleball is going to change their official court size to this anytime soon either.

This idea certainly seems less intrusive than actual pickleball court lines being added to a tennis court as I showed above, especially if that is being done on top of a court that already has 60 foot tennis court lines.  But it also gets only a single pickleball court which doesn't use the space well.

Some facility or clubs feel compelled to address the pickleball segment by adding lines to tennis courts, and to be fair, if doing this can increase court utilization and revenue, it is hard to argue against, but what is the best way to do it?

What do you think?  Are any extra lines on a tennis court off-limits?  Are the 60 foot court lines acceptable and don't annoy you as a tennis player?  Or are you even ok with perpendicular court lines if it can create an additional revenue stream for a facility and keep it open?

Update: A reader shared that a similar rule has been in place in the Southern regulations.  Specifically the rule reads:

1.04D(6): Courts for Local League Play. “Home teams” will have the choice of court surface for which they wish to play their home matches. Court surface must be the same surface for all individual lines unless prior agreement between both captains. The use of tennis-related blended lines are permitted on courts used for local league matches. The use of other lines for another sport, such as Pickleball, are not permitted on courts used for local league matches.