The deadline for people to tell us how they want leisure in Felixstowe to look like in the future is fast approaching.
Suffolk Coastal District Council has launched a five-year programme to redevelop all its leisure centres. Work has already begun on the Deben Leisure Centre in Woodbridge and preparations are in hand to start redeveloping Leiston in the autumn.
As part of this process, Suffolk Coastal is also currently carrying out a consultation exercise to hear what local people want in the Felixstowe area.
“We want to bring state-of-the-art leisure facilities to Felixstowe. This consultation focussed on ‘what’ people want, rather than ‘where’ they should be located,” said Cllr TJ Haworth-Culf, Suffolk Coastal’s cabinet member for Customers, Communities and Leisure.
“The consultation was launched in mid-February and we have already had an excellent response, with nearly 600 people responding to the on-line survey. So a big ‘Thank You’ to all those that have already completed the survey.”
“But we would just like to remind people that the deadline for taking part is approaching fast – so, if you have not already taken part, I would urge you to have your say now!”
The consultation was launched on Monday, 19 February 2018, and runs until the end of April 2018. The survey is available at: https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/felixstoweleisurecentre
As well as carrying out the survey, Suffolk Coastal’s Leisure Team has been going out, making personal presentations and holding meetings with a wide variety of key groups in the local community, including Felixstowe Town Council, Felixstowe Chamber of Commerce, Felixstowe Sports Council, Level Two Youth project, Felixstowe Youth Forum and attending the Felixstowe Flyer Business Breakfast.
Anyone wanting to provide further comments, such as sports or community organisation with specific requirements or issues to highlight, should email the Leisure Team at: leisure@eastsuffolk.gov.uk
Further details of the leisure review are available at: www.eastsuffolk.gov.uk/leisure
The existing Felixstowe Leisure Centre was built in 1985 and Brackenbury Leisure Centre, also in Felixstowe, operated by the Council from the 1990’s. Both facilities are in need of significant money to be spent on them to maintain their current offer.
Through the Leisure Redevelopment Programme, the Council has the opportunity to consider a range of options to provide Felixstowe with sustainable state-of-the-art facilities that local residents can be proud of and that create a focus for tourism opportunities in the town.
The current five-year redevelopment programme of the district’s leisure centres is part of the council’s commitment to improve our leisure centre offer and to encourage more people to become more active.
One of Suffolk Coastal’s 10 critical success factors in its Business Plan focuses on the need to provide high-quality, modern leisure centres that the whole community can enjoy, with state-of-the-art equipment, that come at no additional cost to the tax payer.
The work builds on the progress made by the Leisure Strategy formed in 2014, which sets out how improvements to the leisure provision will be made across the district, over the next ten years.
“When our leisure centres were first built, they gave our communities a great sense of pride and couldn’t have been built without the support and hard work of local groups and residents,” said Cllr Haworth-Culf
“However, our leisure centres are now ageing and need updating to today’s and future standards, so that they have the best facilities available and become the destinations of choice for our residents.”