DISCUSSIONS about a leisure campus development for Westbury are set to get under way next month.
The county-wide campus programme has been presented by Wiltshire Council as a strategy to reduce the long-term financial, environmental and operational pressures on operating ageing, low quality buildings, with a 40% reduction in operating costs. While Westbury had been in the latter stages of the county’s developments, Westbury’s area board has requested to start discussions.
At the next meeting of the Westbury Area Board on Thursday 16th February the council will deliver a presentation about the campus developments currently going on in Wiltshire. Steps towards founding Westbury’s Community Operations Board, which will consist of people from the local community to oversee the development, will also be made.
Julie Swabey, chair of the Westbury Area Board, explained that discussions will be very much in the early stages, concentrating on gathering ideas and a list of what the town needs, rather than addressing the physical nature of the campus. But she is pleased that the discussions are shortly to start. “Now that we’ve expressed an interest in getting it under way, we’ve got to do the fact finding. We need to know which parts of the community are interested, and it’s about getting people from different parts of the community involved,” she said. “This stage is really early, but at least we’ve shown we’re interested in getting plans moving.”
Plans for a Westbury campus were first aired in April last year at a meeting of the Westbury Area Board, but the representative from Wiltshire Council was unable to give any clear indications as to what shape the campus will take, saying that the council wants to listen to the views from residents.
Local people voiced concern over the safeguarding of the town’s listed Victorian swimming pool in the town centre. There were also fears that a new campus would be built on an edge-of-town or out-of-town location, having a detrimental impact on the town centre, as well as affecting public access to the important facilities.
Westbury’s Wiltshire Council-run facilities include the swimming pool, Leighton Recreation Centre, the library, and the youth centre. A campus could take on the form of a single or multiple buildings.
• The discussions will be part of the next meeting of Westbury Area Board, which will be held on Thursday 16th February at Dilton Marsh Social Club.
