Fit City - Irlam Pool

At Irlam Pool, The Trust is supporting the construction of a new sports centre alongside the existing swimming pool. The new space will provide a full sized sports hall, squash court, larger fitness suite, and multi-use studio. The soon to be renamed Irlam and Cadishead Leisure Centre will also have external changing facilities to support Prince's Park's two football pitches and external sports.

Costing in the region of £3milllion pounds the project has been made possible by funding from Salford City Council, Hamilton Davies Trust, Salford Community Leisure and Sport England, with the Hamilton Davies Trust pledging a third of the (total) costs. The real challenge of this scheme has been building the sports centre within a tight budget and securing support from Sport England. Even with the proven need to improve sports facilities in Irlam and Cadishead, the current economic situation made funding the facility much more difficult.

Due to be open in summer 2012, the project is currently running one week behind schedule due to wind and rain delaying steelwork erection. It is envisaged that given fair weather this will be made up over the coming weeks and completion of the construction phrase will be as scheduled in June. Fit out and commissioning will take place late June early July; currently the expected official opening will be late July although the facility will open for use before the official opening ceremony. Interestingly in 1965, the swimming pool also had its official opening in the month of July. We look forward to fixing the exact date for the opening in the next few weeks.

Once completed the centre will continue to be managed by Salford Community Leisure on behalf of Salford City Council.

The roof is now complete and both the ground floor and first floor concrete slabs have been constructed allowing internal work to continue. The contractor Willliams Tarr has recently started excavation work for the car park extension.
As expected it is difficult to carry out such a large construction project without impacting on day to day use; to date the pool has remained open with minimal disruption to business. The pool is planned to close on 15th April until the end of construction phrase to allow the new reception to be built.

Updated 31st January, 2012