Over 1,600 Memberships Taken At New Belfast Leisure Centre

Over 1,600 people have taken up memberships at Lisnasharragh Leisure Centre in east Belfast, the home of the city's largest swimming pool.

The council owned facility was officially opened on Wednesday 18 January after being on 'soft opening' for a month, with hundreds of keen swimmers and fitness fanatics rushing to join.

The £20 million facility is operated by social enterprise GLL under the 'Better' brand and includes a 25 metre, eight lane gala pool with 250 spectator seats, a diving and learner pool with moveable floor, a 140 station gym, a sports hall, spin and exercise studios, a multi-purpose room, two outdoor five-a-side pitches, a cafe and a community facility.

Lord Mayor Councillor Daniel Baker unveiled a ceremonial plaque inside the building on Montgomery Road to mark its official opening. He said the centre will play an important part in delivering the Belfast Agenda vision of building a city where everyone experiences good health and wellbeing by 2035.

Cllr Baker commented: "The scale of investment in leisure facilities in Belfast is unrivalled, with seven new centres being built over a ten year period. These five star facilities will be available at three star prices so that they are accessible to everyone in the city.

"Lisnasharragh is the second of the new centres to be completed following the opening of Olympia in January 2017. It will be the new aquatics centre for Belfast and will be pivotal in helping us achieve our target to double pool usage to 1.5 million pool visits per year by 2030 and increase participation in pool-based activities across a wide range of user groups.

"We have also recently opened the outstanding Brook Leisure Centre, which is a hugely welcome addition to the Colin area of Belfast, while excitement amongst families is palpable ahead of the opening of the new Andersonstown Leisure Centre in a few months' time. The next phase of the Leisure Transformation Programme is already underway with work starting at Avoniel this month and work on the restoration and expansion of Templemore Baths due to start later this year."

Gareth Kirk, GLL Regional Director, added: "GLL is incredibly proud that the Lisnasharragh Leisure Centre is officially opening today. The opening of this centre, along with Brook Leisure Centre in West Belfast, continues to offer premium standard facilities to fulfil our aim of getting more people more active more often across the city.

"Lisnasharragh transforms aquatics in the city and introduces some features that have never before been seen here. We have a new eight lane pool - the biggest in Belfast - that is equipped with timing devices for gala swimming and will also have the first Tom Daley Diving Academy.

"It has been fantastic to see the public support our new centres already, with Lisnasharragh having 1,600 new members joining so far, and in its first month of operation the centre received 18,000 visits.

"We look forward to welcoming even more of the local community to come and check out these two outstanding new centres in the coming weeks."