Pool upgrade scaled back due to budget limitations
A PROPOSED facelift at a Borders swimming pool and fitness centre has been scaled back due to “budgetary limitations”.
An extension to form a new hydrotherapy pool with a café area at Laidlaw Memorial Pool and Waterside Fitness Centre in Jedburgh’s Oxnam Road was rubber-stamped by Scottish Borders Council (SBC) in July last year.
The plans from Jedburgh Leisure Facilities Trust also included alterations to replace the existing roof and installation of a solar photo-voltaic array to the roof.
Now a new and smaller scale planning bid has been submitted to SBC for a hydrotherapy pool only.
A report with the new application, from Hawick-based Turnbull Kyle civil engineers, says: “A proposed extension to the Laidlaw Memorial Pool was awarded full planning consent.
“That project has now been cancelled due to budgetary limitations and I have been commissioned to produce a reduced proposal to keep costs to a more limited budget.
“The brief from the trust outlines the preferred development of the existing facilities as the provision of a hydrotherapy suite with associated changing facilities and internal access on vacant land within the site adjacent to the existing building
“It is also stressed that the opportunity should be taken to ensure that the design addresses ecological issues in the choice of construction materials, energy consumption, energy generation, thermal insulation and future proofing where possible.”
The pool was constructed by Jedburgh Town Council in 1923 as a small municipal swimming facility.
It was later extended by the then regional council in 1974 to provide a much larger 25-metre swimming pool to meet the standards of the day.
This facility served the local population well with the addition of new toilets and changing areas, a children’s play area and other alterations added as demand required over the years.
Management of the pool changed in 2003 when following closure by the regional council the management and responsibility for maintaining and running the facility was taken over by Jedburgh Leisure Facilities Trust.