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Work begins on demolishing baths
Wednesday 10th March 2010, 11:30AM GMT.
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Four decades of history were being brought crashing to the ground today as demolition started at Coseley baths.
A huge claw arm smashed through the back wall of the building in Pear Tree Lane shortly before 9am and was making short work of reducing it to rubble. A gaping hole had been exposed within minutes.
It is expected to take two days to knock down the baths, which opened in 1963.
Brian Guest, who has led the Save Coseley Baths campaign to save the pool, said: “It is a really sad day, not just for the people of Coseley but for all the swimmers in the borough.
“We would like to thank all the people who have supported us, not just financially but also through the hundreds of letters we have received from residents in Coseley, people from across the borough and even around the country.
“What we believe is the decision taken by this council has deprived hundreds of people in the borough of the opportunity to swim and keep fit. This council does not want to listen to what the majority has to say, the councillors should be ashamed of themselves. We shall continue to fight for a new baths in Coseley.”
Heavy duty machinery moved in on Monday afternoon but did not start work on the baths until this morning.
Dudley Council’s cabinet member for property Councillor Adrian Turner said he expected major demolition to be completed by the end of the week.
“What I’m concerned about now is the neighbours and making sure there is as little disturbance as possible.”
The D-day demolition date was due last week but safety fears delayed the works.
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I am returning to the UK at the beggining of April, after spending 13 years in South Africa.
I had some of my fondest memories at the Coseley baths, and looked forward to making many more there with my son.
A very sad day indeed.
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Hi Ian.
Thanks for your e-mail, we were actually on the committee to save the baths. It was awful to see the baths being demolised today. The councillors should be ashamed of themselves for letting this building close.
My husband was one of the first people to officially open these baths and he was the last person out of the pool when it closed.
Our family have spent alot of time there, and have quiet alot of happy memories.
All we can do now is keep trying to get a new baths built sometime in the future.
Please feel free to contact us when your are back in England.
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I must point out that there are a lot of people who are glad to see the back of the horrid place. Some children were scarred mentally for life after being forced to go there.
Good riddance I say.
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That’s the fault of those who forced them – not the building or those who willingly used it.
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I moved to Worcester from sunny Sedgley about 12 years ago. I learned to swim at Coseley Baths and have many many fond memories of the place. I’m gutted it’s now gone. My Mom took me and my Sister there when we were kids and I also remember going to swimming lessons there from Dormston School. I still feel guilty for stopping for a rest (when no-one was looking) half-way through my 400m badge….
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Who cares! Coseley has followed Brierley Hill pool into the history books we now have 50% less public swimming pools in Dudley than we had in the sixties! yes 50 years ago.
The health of the people in Dudley is getting worse so we cut, cut, cut anything that will help solve this problem.
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Sad day indeed, if the councilors refuse to listen to the majority, its time they were gotten rid of too!! The elections are in a few weeks, you know what needs to be done.
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The history of Coseley has been destroyed further.
Remember the Cinema, remember Mount Pleasant School, and now Coseley Baths has gone.
Seems like English history and architecture are not important to these Councillors.
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My husband and family would like to thank each one of you for your kind thoughts about the baths.
Unfortunately, the councillors were just adamant these baths had got to go. We have tried to get these councillors to overturn their descision without success.
Hopefully, we intend to keep fighting till we get a new baths built again in Coseley.
It certainly is a very sad day for us all.
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Don’t forget the people who signed petitions to have them closed.
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It’s difficult to remember something which, to my knowledge, never happened.
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I am Black Country born and bred, moved to Cheltenham 5 yrs ago. Did most of my swimming at Coseley baths and am gutted to see it go! Went there from school and as a child, and continued to use the baths right up to in my 30s with a bunch of mates, then we all used to go straight to the Painter’s Arms for a good pint after a swim!
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Very very sad day just thinking about it, dread going home after work and seeing it.
Will definatly be re-considering my vote this year…what a bunch of idiots. Dont know how they could let this happen.
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I spent many years at these baths with fond memories, it is a sad day indeed. If the council has its way there will be probably a new shiny mosque in its place by next year!!!!!!
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Yes; the elections are coming up and I promise you tories will lose a lot of votes over this, Make sure yOu wear your waterproofs if you come knocking my door,ANGRY;
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They will also gain quite a few as well.
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Just to let you know that when I started work on the above, only Ian’s comment (1) was available.
I am pleased to echo my friends – Phil & Linda Turton in thanking the others on this comment-board and beyond for their support.
Thankyou also to Phil Steven for your supportive comment above, however back-handed it may be. Many people do care. How about Dudley Council?
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Sorry.
The above, referred to above, is actually below:
Thankyou, Ian.
This is a profligate waste of a good solid building that could cost over £10million to build now:
Clad with heavy-loading bricks, with 18 miles of steel reinforcement rods woven into the concrete under the pool, a frame of steel-reinforced concrete pillars (probably girders in concrete) and humungus roof-girders.
According to Dudley Council’s own surveyor’s report, the slabs covering the pool-hall’s roof (aerated concrete with steel rods running through) were only major non-repairable components. They recommended replacement with metal decking at an expected cost of £1.1million. This figure has been disputed as an over-estimate by hundreds of thousands of pounds but is still a fraction of the cost of constructing the whole building or any replacement as good.
Coseley Swimming Bath has co-existed with public pools in Bilston and Tipton since opening. The Black Country has a shortfall of public pools, worsening with increasing demand, and this is now a particular problem for Coseley and Sedgley people. Add those who went to Coseley, including the swimming clubs, for a pool longer than 25meters. How will the 17metre Ellowes Hall School pool and its limited opeing hours be enough just for Sedgley? How will those who used Coseley and the current Bilston, along with the predicted 50,000 extra visits per year all fit into the replacement Bilston pool? The 11-lanes of 33.5meters of Coseley and the current Bilston combined don’t fit into the 8-lanes of 25meters and learner-pool expected for Bilston.
Am I the only one who expects the arguments used to justify closure and demolition to become even more discredited than those used by Dr. Richard Beeching used to close those railway lines which we are now clamouring to have reopened?
With its railway station added to the B’ham New Road, and its central position in the Black Country, Coseley is the ideal location for a 50metre pool.
If only Dudley Council had given the user-group and local residents the chance Walsall Council gave Willenhall Leisure Centre campaigners. No leisure-trust for us. Instead, Dudley Council refused to front-up on the roof issue since a surveyors’ report identified the problem in November 2006 and was in full-public denial about possible closure until springing the decision on everyone in March 2009.
Some may point to the scaled-down replacement youth centre, the retirement village (whose residents would be denied a pool up the road) replacing Wallbrook House, and various tweeks to existing facilities, but this does not go anywhere near balancing-out the loss and continuing need for a public pool for Coseley Sedgley and beyond.
There ain’t very much for 20 to 55 year-olds here now!
More is taken than given and from on high by what has become an alien authority.
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I live in coseley and I’ve got mixed feelings about this.
Part of Coseley has gone which is very sad but to be honest not many were going last year when i used to go there alot.
It needs something teenagers would use alot as too much trouble is happening around Clayton,Jubilee and Teddy Bear over the last 12 months.
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glad its bein pulled down . the place was a dump and an absolute eyesore , also was totally run down i wont be missing the swiming baths there are a lot better pools around . people just got to learn to let go after all its only a pool .
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Just because it was run-down, that didn’t make it beyond redemption.
Also, there weren’t aren’t enough pools in the Black Country, even before Coseley’s closed!
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Well said, Dave the Rave
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Why is that well said?
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They may have removed the building but they have not removed the resentment felt by many people across the borough. They claim it was a financial issue, strange they found enough money to fund their 25% increase in allowances.
Dudley MBC govern by dictatorship and not democracy.
If this is the face of the Tories heaven help us if they get into Government.
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Yes it is very sad that you spent a lot of your childhood there – never mind, it won’t be there much longer.
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For all her knee-jerk praise of anti-Baths comments and cheap sneering sarcasm towards those hurt by a decision the Council never consulted anyone about, Lynn B hasn’t given us much in the way of good reasons to force people in Coseley and Sedgley to go to Biston, Tipton, Dudley, Wombourne etc. if they want to use a pool.
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Drove past the baths on the way to my moms with the children. Spent hours there with friends when I was a child, very very sad. Had started taking my eldest child there and was looking forward to taking my youngest. What a waste of space the councillers are.
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Pity all you moaners didn’t support it when it was open. Lots of people saying they used it as kids but not many saying they supported it in its last few years. Maybe thats the problem!!!!! Plus no one seems to want to mention the large congregation of teenagers which used to hang around it in the evening after closing time either causing alsorts of problems. Rose tinted glasses me thinks!!!!
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It could have been filled every day with people, that wouldn’t have made any difference at all to the decision to close. If Labour had have spent a few quid on maintenance over that last decade, the baths wouldnt have got into such an un-repairable state!!!
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During the past decade, the Conservative group has been in office since 2003.
The major problem was the corrosion of the steel reinforcement rods running through the aerated concrete roof-slabs – a design-fault and not neglect.
Coseley Swimming Bath was not un-repairable: Dudley Council’s own surveyors’ report recommended remedial work on the steel-reinforced concrete pillars, treatment/replacement of roof-girders, and replacement of those pesky roof-slabs with metal decking. They never recommended demolition.
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It’s no good slagging off the current council leaders. Years and years of Labour refusing to spend a penny in maintenance meant that the repair bills were just too much to find. What decision could they have made? Pathetic Labour councilors who couldn’t give a damm about Coseley. Unless they need a speed camera erecting outside their own house!!! Talk about looking after yourself
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The current controlling group (Conservative) has been in office for 7 years – long enough to take responsibility for their own actions and plenty of time to put Coseley Baths right. Halesowen’s pool was also opened in 1963 and money has been found for that.
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I used to go to these baths as i was growing up and even though i haven’t been for ages, it was nice knowing it was always there if i wanted to use it. I went down today to see it before it was ripped apart, i know it wasn’t the most spectacular swimming baths but it was local and cheap, and now will probably be replaced with yet another housing estate, what good can that do the community.
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what a very sad indeed hopefully the people of coseley will get what they deserve when we get the Torie councilors out.
if we don’t get them out what will be for the axe next in coseley maybe the library or even the new youth center that is due to open shortly
come on residents of coseley lets all pull together and show Dudley mbc that we do exist and we am going no where lets make there life’s a misery
rip coseley baths and thanks for the happy memories that you have provided for me and my family and the thousands of other pool users.
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Very sad day today.
Refering to Bigbob(16),I agree that more people should have supported our baths – but with free swimming kids and over 60′s would have done. Also with reference to teenagers – the Baths being demolished doesn’t stop that just moves the probelm to a new area.
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hi their, i think this is a very bad day for the community, i was looking forward to taking all my dy members to this place. I feel like crying
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Hey i cant wait for the mosque to be built yess
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if more people would of put more effort to keep this open then you lot wouldnt be moaning. We just need to pull together as a community at times like these and look forward instead of back!! citroen saxo
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hi there, jon wilkes i am a very big fan of yours. i would like it if you replied to this post and maybe one of the days we could go and get a drink in the painters arms. :)
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hey! i feel very sad that the coseley smimming baths have gone
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Is it me being cynical or should Coseley residents be surprised that the resource used as a polling station is being replaced in quick readiness of the next election? A resource that is only intended for use by a minority of Coseley residents (youth centre). How much has this facility cost and what revenue will be drawn from it? Not as much revenue that the baths would have brought to the coffers I daresay!
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the water quality & pool space at coseley was second to none & there is’nt anywhere better (dave) I swim almost daily & finding it a real chore to swim now as pool space is a real issue Also most of the teenage problem eased when the fencing was erected but it also brings home the lack of facilities for youths as this problem existed when the previous youth centre was open so the new one isnt going to solve it! I’ve been appalled at the lack of interest councillors have shown for public feeling hoping they could sweep it under the carpet. The only way out of the hole they’ve dug is to promise not to sell the land & look for ways to fund another pool & sports hall but I bet they need the money from the sale to fund projects outside of Coseley & Sedgley!!!!
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I have been to an area meeting and witnessed a councillor telling a full room ( of people interested in the baths) he didn’t want to talk about Coseley anymore & another councillor throwing her head back & laughing at questions. It was then that I realised that they were only interested in fulfilling their own agenda and not in any way the publics. They have leapt in to remove the baths ASAP and have shown contempt at replacing it with the excuse of funding, without ever really trying The excuse used not to replace / repair has been the proximity of the new build at Bilston, well Wolverhampton council didn’t worry about the proximity of Coseley when they began planning did they? Maybe if we replace the Cabinet we may have more luck after May? Use your votes people and show them we matter and we WILL be heard
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Well we all know what to do on polling day dont we get this rottern council out!
i urge coseley resident who dont vote to give a bloody nose to the tories.
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