Opening up our leisure centres
Our sports and leisure facilities also play a vital role in helping our community to stay healthy, but they must be safe to use. We have tried to open our leisure centres as quickly as possible, as COVID-19 restrictions are eased, and we have introduced improvements to make visits more enjoyable.
Cllr André Bourne, Cabinet member responsible for leisure centres, outlines recent developments and next steps to ensure residents’ needs are central to decisions moving forward.
“Leisure centres were sorely missed during the months of lockdown. It’s been clear how important they are to the health and wellbeing of our residents - and how welcome the reopening has been.
“We have invested millions of pounds in the past year to improve and run our facilities, ensuring they are clean, safe and comfortable to use.
“Our new partnership with Greenwich Leisure Limited – also known as Better – meant that on 12 April we were able to open Forest Hill Pools, Glass Mill Leisure Centre and Wavelengths Leisure Centre gym. On the same day, through our ongoing partnership with 1Life, we were able to open Downham Health and Leisure Centre.
Improvements
“While our leisure centres were closed, we were busy improving them. We’ve invested in things like decoration and deep cleaning, as well as upgrading the entrances and communal areas at Glass Mill and Wavelengths; plus some work behind the scenes that you won’t necessarily see but will help to keep things running better, including a new access control system at Glass Mill, and new air cooling systems across the centres.
“Feedback from customers returning to them has been overwhelmingly positive. Residents and partners have particularly praised the centres’ cleanliness, comfort, safety, good organisation and staff enthusiasm.
“Our work with Better to extensively upgrade Wavelengths Leisure Centre – where we have invested £300,000 - includes fully retiling the 25m pool to guarantee its life for the next 20 years. We are improving the changing facilities for this pool, which will re-open in the summer. We have also – among other things - installed new water fountains, updated sound systems and upgraded flooring in the gym and studios.
"We are fleshing out ideas for The Bridge Leisure Centre site and hope to share these with residents later this year.
Financial challenges
“Leisure centres are very expensive to run - it costs many millions to run ours in 2019/20 – and there’s no doubt the leisure industry generally has been hit extremely hard by the COVID-19 pandemic, and the lockdowns and restrictions necessary to protect lives.
“We have been working closely with our partners to ensure as many facilities as possible have been able to open safely as soon as guidelines have allowed, but we have not been able to give a date for the reopening of Wavelengths leisure pool because it needs very significant investment.
“During lockdown, much of its infrastructure seized up and failed. It will cost £700,000 to get it up and running again. This is on top of the £400,000 every year the pool loses – it’s incredibly expensive to run because of its size and the ceiling height.
“As many of you will know, the Council is under intense financial pressure and needs to make savings of £40m over the next three years, so funds for leisure services are very limited. We need to think carefully about how to spend these limited funds to benefit as many people as possible.
Consulting our residents
“We have promised not to make a decision about the future of the leisure pool before we speak to you. It’s right that we involve local residents and the wider community when making decisions like this - we want to make sure we’re spending our leisure budget where it’s needed.
“I have asked that the consultation includes options for a pool, as well as other family-friendly facilities. We have no intention of mothballing Wavelengths – we want to make sure the space is used and benefits local people.
“I am a Dad of two young children. My kids love going swimming, and we used to use Wavelengths a lot. I understand that not having a pool at the moment is disappointing. My kids and I are sad about it too! But when the 25m pool opens in the summer we’ll be there using it again. And if we can reopen the leisure pool we will, after we’ve consulted with local residents.
“But the financial situation Lewisham Council is in is acute, and there are no easy answers here. I wish this was a simple decision that we could take, but it’s not. That’s why we will have a public consultation, so we have the support of the community for our next steps.”