SPECIAL REPORT: Worcester's Sansome Walk swimming pool facing end of an era as demolition looms

Worcester City Council has announced how it intends to raze the site to the ground early next year, bringing an end to more than 160 years of swimming at the same site.

Jubilant campaigners are also celebrating after plans were revealed to sell the land off for housing, with previous suggestions it could become a car park dead in the water.

The city's Labour leadership is expected to give up the chance to turn the site into a money-spinning parking facility after residents who feared traffic chaos mounted serious opposition.

Instead, bosses say they will investigate "how the land can be developed to accommodate new housing", with hopes a sale can bring £500,000 into the coffers.

The Labour cabinet is meeting next Tuesday to approve the demolition plan, which will follow soon after the doors close in January.

In the time between the doors closing and it being knocked down, the council says it will also fund security at the site to keep vandals out, amid some concerns it could become a magnet for trouble.

It means the pool - which opened in April 1972 to wild fanfare - now faces its end after 45 years' service to the city.

Sarah Markwell, 71, of Tennis Walk, Arboretum, said: "It's been here for a long time and many people will be sad to see it go.

"But progress has to be made. People have loved this pool, entire generations did."

Paul Brohan, vice-chairman of Arboretum Residents Association, said: "For us it's very good news they are looking at housing, we've been putting a lot of pressure on the council.

"The problem with a car park was, people would all drive around it looking for a free space - we don't need the traffic and we don't need our spaces taken."

A report for the cabinet says if left empty, Sansome Walk pool could become a target for vandalism, theft and fire, as well as trespassers at risk of falling from a height.

The leadership is being asked to agree for security at the site, and for staff to secure legal permission for a demolition "as soon as possible".

It will shut once the new £10.5 million Perdiswell Swimming Pool opens on Saturday, January 7.

Cllr Joy Squires, the council's deputy leader, said: "After 45 years it will be sad to see the end of Sansome Walk, but the new Perdiswell pool will bring fantastic new facilities for swimmers of all abilities.

"Now we need to focus on making the Sansome Walk site safe and look to its longer term future, so I hope cabinet members will support these recommendations."

The housing options could include selling it to a developer, leasing the land, or the council entering into a joint venture with a third party.

A LONG HISTORY NOW COMING TO AN END

IT opened in a blaze of glory back in April 1972, at a massive cost of £500,000 after years of campaigning.

Officially titled 'Worcester Swimming Pool', the current facility at Sansome Walk replaced a previous pool which had stood on the same site for 117 long years.

The 1970s development had an incredible impact on the city with just about every man, woman and child flocking to it - the grown-ups paying 15p and children just 8p.

But remarkably, swimming has been offered at the same site since at least the mid-19th century.

In 1852 a private businessman called Barnabus Lett opened a swimming pool facility, which was sold on to other investors before being bought by William Park and given the title 'Park's Hydro Baths'.

The Park family, who acquired it in 1890, went on to keep it until the council took over in 1946, with the facility known as 'Park's Puddle' by residents even long after the takeover.

By the time the current Sansome Walk pool opened, which is officially called 'Worcester Pool & Fitness Centre' these days, it came after decades of concern about the previous facilities.

In the 1980s it fell into the doldrums and was seen as cold, dark and dingy but a £45,000 makeover and aggressive marketing led to a revival.

In its heyday the number of visitors at the current Sansome Walk pool have topped 400,000 a year.