Community campaign to save swimming pool hailed 20 years on
It spanned 140 days and was to become one of the most effective and celebrated community protests ever mounted in Scotland.
Exactly 20 years on, a neighbourhood’s fight to save public baths in the southside of Glasgow – including a landmark takeover of the building – will be hailed in a programme of special events.
The campaign to save the pool in Govanhill was launched on January 17, 2001, two days after Kingston Swimming Club received notice the city council intended to close the building.
This sparked the longest occupation of a public building in British history as a community campaign to reclaim and restore the pool began.
On March 21, 2001, protesters occupied the Edwardian bathhouse. They would remain there for 140 days until August, when a sheriff and mounted police were ordered to end the protest.
Twenty years later and the Calder Street venue is approaching a long-awaited refurbishment into a community and well-being centre. The pandemic has caused delays but Govanhill Baths Community Trust hopes to have work completed in 2022.
Fatima Uygun, manager of the Trust, said: “Individuals coming together in a common cause have real power and so does a community. Govanhill came together to save its pool and Govanhill won.” To celebrate the start of the community action in Scotland’s history, the Trust is staging a programme of events throughout the year with the full programme being launched later this month.