8x 25m lane competitive pool

[stevenewman1]

Just returned form a public consultation evening where a 300 strong audience were presented with a plan where Harlow Pool (45 yrs old), Harlow Sportscentre (40 yrs old and apparently first one ever in the country to be built!) and Harlow Football club (125 years in existence not sure how long at present site) would all have their present facilities demolished and replaced with a new leisurecentre which currently includes 8x 25m lane pool, 3 x20m learning pool and Therapy pool (spectator gallery for 350, car parking for 500+ cars). A replacement football ground would be built of Conference league stature.

I look forward to you all swimming at our new pool in Spring 2006 if the planning applications "in principle" are agreed February 4th 2004 :devil:

[GettingFaster]

You couldn't persuade them to make it a 50m pool I suppose...?

Oh well, no harm asking (sigh)

[Pete]

The pool needs eough space poolside to facilitate swimmers for a large meet but 350 spectator capacity needs reviewing to mayby 500 if possible.

[GettingFaster]

Guildford Spectrum's 350 I think, and it's pretty cramped for big meets. Surreys are there this year and I'm expecting it to be decidedly 'cosy' in the gallery, to say the very least!

[Bazza]

Yeah Waterlooville has about 330 and it's not enough when we host counties. A new 8 lane pool would presumably win this honour, so you need as much spactating as you can get, and also as Pete says, *room on poolside for swimmers*!

[stevenewman1]

Yeah Waterlooville has about 330 and it's not enough when we host counties. A new 8 lane pool would presumably win this honour, so you need as much spactating as you can get, and also as Pete says, *room on poolside for swimmers*!

Would you sacrifice two lanes so that you could have more space around the pool? OR would you expect both? Whats the new Hatfield pool (is it Hatfield?) like - does that have both?

[chris_lamb]

Would you sacrifice two lanes so that you could have more space around the pool? OR would you expect both? Whats the new Hatfield pool (is it Hatfield?) like - does that have both?

Removing two lanes would make it unsuitable for county competitions!

[Bazza]

Personally I would like both, but I would say Waterlooville has an average amount of space poolside. More than alot of older pools but still not enough (ala Ponds Forge!).

I went to Hatfield about 18 months ago and their pool from memory had fairly decent spectating and enough room poolside when the attached teaching pool was closed for teams to sit around.

[Mark]

The new pool which opened in August in Hatfield on the University of Hertfordshires DeHaviland campus is a 8 lane 25m pool with seating for 250 on the upper floor so ALL seats get a good view as well as plenty of standing room behind. (www.hertfordshiresporstvillage.co.uk)
However around poolside space is tight and there is no other pool on site.
From what I understand that even if sport england had backed the 50m pool here, seating would have only been about 450.
Pools now days are described as being built to National Short or Long course standard, who sets these standards as I think most of us could note many improvments that could be made at most pools!
So from what you describe about Harlow sounds like a good package but if you could get a 50m pool as we do need them down here in the south.
Lets hope the olympic pool in east london gets built!
Mark.

[Mark]

The new pool which opened in August in Hatfield on the University of Hertfordshires DeHaviland campus is a 8 lane 25m pool with seating for 250 on the upper floor so ALL seats get a good view as well as plenty of standing room behind. (www.hertfordshiresportsvillage.co.uk)
However around poolside space is tight and there is no other pool on site.
From what I understand that even if sport england had backed the 50m pool here, seating would have only been about 450.
Pools now days are described as being built to National Short or Long course standard, who sets these standards as I think most of us could note many improvments that could be made at most pools!
So from what you describe about Harlow sounds like a good package but if you could get a 50m pool as we do need them down here in the south.
Lets hope the olympic pool in east london gets built!
Mark.

Sorry www.hertfordshiresportsvillage.co.uk

[Dreama]

The 50m pool at Aldershot is really nice, but when building 50m pools wouldn't it be a good idea to have good spectating areas so there can be more scope for hosting competitions as well as training, that is just the shortfall at aldershot, the spectator area. Then when they built the Manchester Aquatics centre they didn't exactly create the best spectating area did they? For the commonwealths they had to add all those extra seats at one end. I always thought that when you're going to build a brand new facility it would be improvement on what's gone before ie. Ponds Forge, yet we still have failed to see any better pool being built in the country to rival it.

[chris_lamb]

The 50m pool at Aldershot is really nice, but when building 50m pools wouldn't it be a good idea to have good spectating areas so there can be more scope for hosting competitions as well as training, that is just the shortfall at aldershot, the spectator area.

Aldershot was badly designed on purpose - they did not want it to be usable for competitions!

Then when they built the Manchester Aquatics centre they didn't exactly create the best spectating area did they? For the commonwealths they had to add all those extra seats at one end. I always thought that when you're going to build a brand new facility it would be improvement on what's gone before ie. Ponds Forge, yet we still have failed to see any better pool being built in the country to rival it.

One problem with building a pool for a major competition such as the commonwealth games or olympics is that the spectator space needed will be far too large for just about any other competition. That is one reason that a temporary pool is such an attractive proposition for planners. Any new pool has to be viable in the long term, and realistically a pool with enough capacity for a major international championships is going to be very difficult to run economically unless parts of it can be changed to another use afterwards.

[Bazza]

But presumably Ponds Forge is economically viable. I mean it's been going fine for over a decade now. So why can't we have more pools like that, which can host national or international events without appearing substandard?

[Dreama]

i was just wondering - how come we don't have a world cup meet at Ponds Forge, its widely regarded as one of the best pools in the world yet I never hear of any world cup meets being held there? Or have I just been oblivious to it?

[chris_lamb]

But presumably Ponds Forge is economically viable. I mean it's been going fine for over a decade now. So why can't we have more pools like that, which can host national or international events without appearing substandard?

Yeah, but Ponds Forge isn't suitable for the commonwealth games or olympics...

Ponds Forge has 2,600 seats. They will have 11,000 seats at the main pool in Athens. I seem to remember hearing something about 30,000 seats for the main olympic pool in london.

[Pete]

Chris
We are not talking about Pond's Forge holding the Olympics.
Also I really can't see London having a pool with 30 000 seats. That's the capacity of St Mary's, Southampton's Football Stadium; A swimmimg pool is about an eighth the size of a football pitch.
Is the Athens pool outside?

[chris_lamb]

Chris
We are not talking about Pond's Forge holding the Olympics.


No, but we were talking about Pond's Forge being an example of a pool that is capable of holding a major international championships (which I think we concluded it wasn't) and being economically viable.

Also I really can't see London having a pool with 30 000 seats. That's the capacity of St Mary's, Southampton's Football Stadium; A swimmimg pool is about an eighth the size of a football pitch.

Certainly not long term, but as a temporary venue it is possible - although it may be that this figure includes spectator space in the other pools such as diving, water polo and synchro.

Is the Athens pool outside?

I think so.

[Dreama]

actually I was talking world cups, and if you read the Berlin news clippets they had 2000 spectators there, so i'm still yet to see why Ponds forge is not part of the World Cup Calendar at least

[Bazza]

It used to be - I think they used to move it around a bit but these days they stick to mostly the same venues each year, in Europe at least.

Chris - wasn't Ponds Forge built to hold a world championships? Or maybe it was Europeans I can't remember. Still I would regard the Europeans as a major international championships, just as many people.

[swimbuoy]

Also I really can't see London having a pool with 30 000 seats

Neither can I! I couldn't see a damn thing in Sydney & that was only 17,000. Fortunately this was not the case in the first few rows where I managed to sit for most of the week. ;) :)

Is the Athens pool outside?

My understanding is that it is outdoors but partially covered as I believe was the case in Atlanta.

[bobby]

Bazza, I think Ponds Forge was built for the World Student Games.

[Bazza]

OK so it has held the World Student Games and the European shortcourse championships. There are problems with Ponds Forge/Sheffield (accommodation, parking, etc), but the pool and hall itself would be fit to host most competitions IMO. And this is 12 years on.

Yet we now have a less impressive pool in Manchester, though some aspects are better, eg another 50m pool downstairs, and not much else. Bath and Millfield are both newer I think, but these seem to have been built more for training purposes, as is Aldershot.

The debate goes on...

[lane4]

Ponds Forge was built as part of the sporting facilities throughout Sheffield for the World University Games in 1991. In 1993 it staged the European Long Course Championships and later hosted the short course version. Numerous World Cup meets have been held at Ponds Forge, I and other forum members were fortunate enough to compete in them, some of them were even televised.

Politics is the reason why GB is no longer on the World Cup calendar.

The reason we do not have plenty of them around the country is that it cost £60m to build - and that was in 1991. To replicate that now would probably be double that!

The new pool in Dublin was modelled on Ponds Forge however.

There are at least 10 decent and reasonably priced hotels within easy walking distance of Ponds Forge so I'm not sure why you think it has accommodation probs Baz? In fact, I would say it is one of the best pools around for finding accommodation nearby.

30000 is technically possible if the Olympic swimming events were staged in a temporary pool inside another venue, e.g. the Dome or at Wembley. I think 10000 is the minimum IOC requirement.

[stevenewman1]

Another snippet from the public consultation of our potentially new pool is that the local Council have got in contact with the London Olympic Committee and asked that it be considered to be used for official training purposes if London were to win the bid in 2012. I do not know of the response but it seems inappropriate considering it will only be a 25m pool.

[Bazza]

Re: Accommodation, just regarding the fact that whenever there is a big meet there all the hotels are booked up months in advance! :p

In other words if there was a big(ger) meet there, all the swimming folk would fill all the hotels, which might be a problem for Sheffield?

[bobby]

There is still accommodation available slightly further afield but with the trams it is possible to get to Ponds Forge easily still.

[londoner62]

Re: Accommodation, just regarding the fact that whenever there is a big meet there all the hotels are booked up months in advance! :p

In other words if there was a big(ger) meet there, all the swimming folk would fill all the hotels, which might be a problem for Sheffield?

I tend to think if you know you are going to be competing somewhere on a given date, why wait until the last minute to try and find digs? I booked my digs for Sheffield in October last weekend because I know I am gonna be there.

Beckenham SC used to book accomodation on the grounds that someone from the club would need it but should the unthinkable occur and nobody(!)qualified then they would contact a local club to offload the rooms!

Paul

[chris_lamb]

Ponds Forge has 2,600 seats. They will have 11,000 seats at the main pool in Athens. I seem to remember hearing something about 30,000 seats for the main olympic pool in london.

Looks like I was about 10,000 seats off:

40m pool project is double boost for Games bid (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,4803-972463,00.html) (from The Times)

It would be interesting to see them taking the olympic pool on a tour of the country!

[chlorine_babe]

Looks like I was about 10,000 seats off:

40m pool project is double boost for Games bid (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,4803-972463,00.html) (from The Times)

It would be interesting to see them taking the olympic pool on a tour of the country!

Sounds good reading the article when I first read your link I thought it was a 40m pool instead of £40million pool

[chris_lamb]

Sounds good reading the article when I first read your link I thought it was a 40m pool instead of £40million pool

The 40m pool is just what they will build, not what they will intend to build. :D

[Bazza]

Fingers crossed eh?! :)

[Dreama]

I can't wait, the next decade sounds awesome on a swimming scale if we do get the Wrolds (SC & LC) and the Olympics woohoo!

[Steve]

Can someone post the text of the article (or give me the gist)? The Times site puts the story behind their registration (which now costs grrrr. :()

[londoner62]

Swimming



January 22, 2004

£40m pool project is double boost for Games bid
By Craig Lord
A look at ambitious plans that could seee the capital host two world-class sporting events



A NEW state-of-the-art swimming arena that has two 50-metre pools built on top of each other is to be the main feature of Britain’s planned bid to host the 2009 World Championships. It is hoped that the revolutionary facility will also be one of the centrepieces of a London Olympic Games in 2012.
The aquatics centre will have an underground Olympic-size swimming pool, which would be a permanent legacy for the capital, and at ground level a structure built on steel stilts that would house a temporary racing pool and seating that would allow world record attendances of 20,000 for the 2012 Games.



The facility would later be converted to a football stadium or concert hall in keeping with a pledge from Barbara Cassani, the chairman of the London Olympic bid, that the capital would be left with “no white elephants”.

Work on the permanent pool is scheduled to begin as early as June next year — a month before London learns whether it will host the 2012 Games — as part of the Government’s commitment to improve the woeful provision of modern swimming facilities in the capital. It is being designed by S & P Architects for the site of the 500-acre Olympic Park at lower Lea Valley in East London and will cost an estimated £40 million of national lottery money set aside by Sport England.

On the strength of that commitment, British Swimming, the national federation, is planning to bid for the 2009 World Long-Course Championships. The lack of an arena with two Olympic 50-metre pools — one for racing, the other for warming up before and easing down after races — has blocked previous hopes of hosting the championships.

If the bid proves successful, the 2009 championships would act as a test event for the Olympic Games. Britain is already competing to host the World Short-Course Championships in Manchester in 2008, partly in recognition of the need for home officials and organisers to gain experience of putting on world-class events, and partly on the back of the success enjoyed by Great Britain’s swimmers since the arrival from Australia of Bill Sweetenham as the national performance director.

The inclusion of a temporary pool in the Olympic plans would meet Cassani’s promise of “excellence without extravagance” in London’s £4 billion bid. A ten-lane, 50-metre pool — like the one built for the World University Games at Ponds Forge, Sheffield, in 1991 — would cost more than £20 million, but a temporary pool can be constructed, filled and removed for less than £3 million.

It would also open the possibility of taking the 2012 Olympic pool on a tour of Britain after the Games so that “every child in the country can get to swim in the London Olympics pool”, David Sparkes, the chief executive of British Swimming, said. “The point of mixing the permanent with the temporary is that we will have a legacy for the sport and a phenomenal facility for the Games that will help to keep costs low and be reusable in a way that will help to inspire future champions for Britain.”

Temporary structures have revolutionised swimming since the first 25-metre pool was constructed on Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro for the World Short-Course Championships in 1995. The concept has been extended to Olympic 50-metre pools, with the past two World Long-Course Championships, in Fukuoka, Japan, in 2001 and Barcelona last summer, held in temporary pools built inside vast exhibition halls. The temporary stand at the Homebush Olympic pool enabled Sydney to boast the biggest swimming crowd — 17,000 — on each of the eight days of racing at the 2000 Games. London’s plans would exceed that.

The construction of a 50-metre temporary pool uses about 200,000 tonnes of steel for the stilts and a tank that has to withstand the pressure of 1.8 million litres of water. A porous lining allows leakage of water, which is pumped back into the pool.

Three temporary pools will back up the main facilities for the 2006 Commonwealth Games in Melbourne, and London will need more than the two proposed Olympic pools in order to host the Games. Sites are being identified for water polo and training facilities, while the new Olympic Park aquatics centre is likely to have a permanent diving pool in a separate hall. A suggestion that Olympic diving could be held in a temporary pool in Trafalgar Square has been dismissed as unworkable and against the concept of the London bid.

The double-decker pool concept has been used elsewhere, although never with a temporary pool. Berlin’s vast Schwimmhalle has permanent Olympic pools on two levels, although not directly above each other, while in Monaco an Olympic pool lies directly below the Stade Louis II football stadium.

“It’s a very exciting time for swimming and the plan for London will be great for the community,” Sparkes said. “The permanent pool would be the first to be built and will allow us to bid for the 2009 World Championships. By that time we would also have had a commitment to other pools for the full Olympic centre for all aquatic disciplines, and we would have identified a support network of other swimming sites around London.”

One of those could be the national sports centre at Crystal Palace. The pool there, built in the 1960s, is due to be closed but there is a plan to build a new 50-metre training and community centre nearby, which hinges on the issue of delisting the old building and improving transport links.


Enjoy!!!!!!

Paul

[Coach]

But presumably Ponds Forge is economically viable. I mean it's been going fine for over a decade now. So why can't we have more pools like that, which can host national or international events without appearing substandard?

No!! Most pools make a loss. I believe that 3 Sheffield Pools had to close in ourder to justify the building of Ponds Forge (aka the White Elephant)

[Dreama]

most...Scarborough's doesn't, but then there is only one proper pool in Scarborough

[Bazza]

So if Ponds Forge is not economically viable why hasn't it closed down? Which three pools closed? If you consider you now have a 10 lane 50m pool it could be worth closing even 3 x 6 lane 25m pools, the only thing is it means people have to go further to use it, but for competitive use it is far better.