A Chance to Comment
Rother District Council (RDC) have just launched a consultation process on their new draft Rother Health and Well-being: Leisure Facilities Strategy. This addresses the full range of leisure activities for the provision and improvement of public health facilities. Importantly, and especially in the context of the Rye swimming pool closure, it is your opportunity to provide feedback and comments through both a questionnaire and invitation to email more detailed comments:
Draft Leisure Facilities Strategy
Sport England Assessment of Swimming Pool Provision
Given the current loss of a major leisure facility serving Rye and the surrounding area this is an important opportunity to make your views felt – either on the swimming pool closure, or on wider leisure and well-being issues. By simply extracting a few comments from the strategy makes it even more incredible that any reduction in leisure facilities has been permitted … let alone a fully functional swimming pool.
Community Consultation Summary
- Increasingly, Rother residents recognise the need to be more active to improve their health
- The majority of residents want to travel no more than 15 minutes to a leisure facility
- The activities that people most want to take part in include walking, cycling, swimming
- At 30% swimming facilities were twice as much wanted as any other facility. Gyms attract 10% of respondents and studios / halls 20% of respondents
- The lack of any teaching pools impacts on the ability of children to learn to swim; in a coastal area this is a critical life skill
- Many clubs have ambitions to grow and would like to see improved facilities to support this
- Improved facilities for those with a disability are highlighted as a priority
- Access to facilities in the daytime is key, particularly for older residents
- There is a need to provide more physical activities for children
- The facilities most wanted in the district are:
- Laned swimming pool
- Outdoor fitness facilities
- Café
- Improved facilities for disabled
- More local gyms
- Partnership working is key, particularly in relation to swimming provision
- There is an under-supply of swimming pools to meet demand
Swimming Pools
- There is limited provision of laned swimming in the district
- Future opportunities to increase provision of swimming pools should be considered, and specifically a laned pool with daytime access. This would better meet the needs of older residents in district and better contribute to opportunities for residents and visitors to be more active. The older population, and specifically the 85+ age group is set to increase significantly to 2036
- The current population needs 988 sq. m of water space to meet demand. There is currently publicly accessible swimming pool provision of 843 sq. m. This means there is an existing under-supply of swimming pool provision
- Future opportunities to increase provision of swimming pools should be considered, and specifically a laned pool with daytime access. This would better meet the needs of older residents in district and better contribute to opportunities for residents and visitors to be more active.
Note that these are extracts, the full document, and appendices, provide a wealth of detail in all areas of leisure provision in Rother for health & well-being. However, it is clear that there is a shortage of swimming and other leisure facilities, even before the Rye closure, and allowing the closure of a functioning (and the newest) pool in Rother when there is clear demand to build a new facility seems perverse in the extreme.
With an ageing population and surprising amounts of deprivation, Rye, and the area it serves, needs local access to leisure facilities to ensure that we build and maintain an inclusive, sustainable, and healthy community.
Rye News strongly recommends that you read these documents and make your views clear to Rother District Council by December 20, 2022.
For more detailed responses to the strategy email: consultations@rother.gov.uk
Image Credits: Rye News library , Freedom Leisure .