Revamp will close pool until April
A VALLEYS swimming pool used by more than 60,000 people each year is to close for two months as work is carried out to refurbish the changing rooms and redecorate the pool.
Bronwydd Swimming Pool in Porth is the first of four facilities in Rhondda Cynon Taf to be refurbished, and from Monday the pool will close for the works, with it expected to reopen in April.
The centre’s gym will remain open, but with altered hours.
Rhondda Cynon Taf Council, which is carrying out the works, has advised pool users that the nearest alternative pool is at the Rhondda Sports Centre in Ystrad.
The works are as part of a wider £750,000 investment agreed last year that will also see improved facilities at Sobell Leisure Centre in Aberdare, Abercynon Sports Centre and the centre in Ystrad.
Councillor Ann Crimmings, cabinet member for environment and leisure, said: “This £750,000 investment in changing room improvements at four of the council’s leisure facilities builds upon the significant recent funding in leisure, as a key area of investment in the ongoing £200m #RCTinvest scheme.
“The council will work closely with contractors to complete the works as quickly as possible, and I would like to thank residents and pool users in advance for their cooperation.”
According to the local authority, the pool’s gym will open from 8am to 8pm from Mondays to Thursdays, 8am to 7pm on Fridays, and 8am to 3pm on weekends.
The second changing rooms scheme will start at Ystrad’s Rhondda Sports Centre in late March, ending in early June, but for those works, the pool will not close as there are alternative changing rooms on site.
The third and fourth schemes at Sobell and Abercynon are scheduled for later this year, with dates and details to be announced closer to the time.
In September, as the council announced the closure of the Rhondda Fach Sports Centre pool in Tylorstown, it was revealed almost 65,000 people used Bronwydd pool in the year 2016/17 - the fifth most popular centre in the county borough.
Coun Crimmings added: “The council has revealed ambitious plans to provide every resident with an all-weather outdoor 3G pitch within a three-mile radius – no matter where they live in the county borough. There has also been vast investment in the very latest gym equipment in our leisure centres, with the new fitness centre in Llantrisant, which opened recently, the latest in a long list of recent upgrades.”