At Wednesday evening's 70th annual UNE Sports Awards, Chancellor Mr James Harris announced a $7 million full redevelopment of the UNE's swimming pool and the sports centre main amenities and change-rooms.
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Chancellor Harris said construction would commence next month with work expected to be completed in August next year.
Chancellor Harris said the decision represented a major capital reinvestment by UNE.
"It reflects a significant endorsement of SportUNE’s services and facilities to the University and the wider community, and a recognition of the role played by sport in the broader student experience," he said.
Director of UNE Life David Schmude described it as was a very exciting announcement.
"The pool has been closed now for probably 18-months, so it has been a long time coming, but again there has been a lot of work done behind the scenes on the design and planning," Mr Schmude said.
"It was built back in 1980, so it would be one of regional Australia's oldest indoor swimming pools."
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The new facility will continue to feature a 25-metre, six-lane indoor heated pool. In addition, there will be a revitalised physical space, which will utilise a state-of-the-art, environmentally beneficial geothermal base heating system.
This heating system will regulate the temperature across the extreme variations of weather experienced over a typical Armidale year. Gas heating will provide further support to the system.
He said the water temperature would be at about 28 degrees to cater for the big cross section of users.
The pool was extensively used when it was in action.
- David Schmude
"We have about 2200 members, of which a little over 1000 are from the community," Mr Schmude said.
"We accommodated lap swimmers, learn to swim, squads, aerobics; we could have had from infants right through to 90-year-old’s swimming in that pool and doing some sort of activity.
"We're looking at bringing all that back online next year."
During the construction phase, the existing change-rooms will not be available, but SportUNE will be providing temporary amenities.