London Pools Campaign: York Hall

As you may have seen on London Tonight news this evening, the Council agreed earlier this evening to award the new leisure contract for running leisure facilities throughout Tower Hamlets to Greenwich Leisure Ltd. This is a 15-year contract and is an arrangement which secures a ring-fenced £4.72m funding package for YH. The investment which will be made over the next 2 years is enough to undertake all the required maintenance and refurbishment work and to keep the facility open for at least the next 15 years.

The only minor downside is that it will be necessary at some point in 2005-6 temporarily to close the facilities at York Hall in order to allow the maintenance works to go ahead. We have, however, been assured that this will be kept to a minimum and progress of the works are to be monitored closely by the Council. Nor will the temporary closure happen until the new Mile End facilities are up and running. Finally, we have also asked that the User Group be formally constituted and given a more prominent role in the new management of the facility.

So, watch this space! In the current environment and with various pressures on Council budgets, this is probably the best possible result we could have got for York Hall. It is also a tribute to the lobbying and all the hard work which members of the community, the Users Group and the consultative committee have put in over the last year.

Cllr. John Griffiths (Bethnal Green North Ward)
134 Old Ford Road
London E2 9PW
T. 020 8980 2814
M. 07887 643980
E. johngriffiths@tinyonline.co.uk

The great public health legislation of the Victorian age paved the way for an East End institution that has just been saved from closure.

York Hall is a multi-cultural sporting and leisure facility in Bethnal Green, near the tube station. York Hall is used extensively not only by the local community but also by the wider population of London. It's famous internationally as a boxing-venue, hosts public and community events � especially weddings, has one of the largest Victorian Russian and Turkish baths in the UK, in use for generations, a full-size swimming-pool, gym, café etc. It's the beating heart of Tower Hamlets - even though it's been allowed to run down over the last 20 years it has charm, character and pazazz! If you haven't visited York Hall why not come and give it a go! By supporting this unique venue you may help to save it � and preserve it for future generations.

Tower Hamlets Council are discussing plans to redevelop the York Hall site to build flats and destroy key elements of York Hall's sports and leisure facilities � losing the Hall, reducing the pool to a small, shallow play-area and replacing the Turkish Baths with a small steam-room. There are no guarantees that any part of what we currently have will be kept. People who sign the petitions say they want York Hall to be refurbished and improved. Do you want even more of your heritage to be lost?

If you use any part of York Hall, care about its future and want to preserve and improve it, please sign the petition and join the protests - help make the campaign more effective. When the Council discusses its plans with users we'll need a lot of people there to tell them what we want and need.

"AMBIENCE Bland. A sea of beige as far as the eye can see, and the reception area is inexplicably cluttered with displays of make up and Thalgo products, which are used in the treatments. The refurbishment of the old Turkish Baths, open since 1926, has been resisted by many regular visitors to York Hall, which is in the heart of one of the five most impoverished boroughs in the country. Spa London lacks the open space and sense of freedom the Turkish Baths had, but nevertheless, a refurbishment to the facilities was long overdue - it's nice to see ceilings without whacking huge holes in, for example."

(Via Spa London, Bethnal Green, London - Times Online : .)

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Once again the proud bathers of Bethnal Green prove their inability to sit astride a fence and in a smashingly written piece give a blunt verdict on the 'refurbished' York Hall Spa marked with our own anaerobic punctuation that only swimming can sustain.

"In place of its rich environment of exchange, humour, banter, encounters with people you would never meet anywhere else, the treasured sharing of confidences, group discussions of ailments and medical anxieties, the lovely giving and taking of schmeissing and massage, the sheer pleasure to be at ease, naked, in the company of people from all religions, all cultures and races, gay and straight, any and all political persuasions and from all socio-economic backgrounds - instead of all this, we have the luxury-lite privileged self-indulgence of Spa London, a Musak-filled, Aroma-infested world of such terrifying banality that I could only take it for half an hour before I ran out. "

(Via Yorkhall at Yahoo! Groups Good-bye York Hall: .)

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"Today, having seen the new 'Spa', it's clear our concerns were justified. The new set-up has professionalised and commodified experiences that formerly belonged to the users, so that 'relaxation' is something we are supposed to aim for, and pay extortionate charges for, not simply what happens when the facilities and company are right. It's a bit like telling people to be happy, insisting that happiness costs money... it's about control. People have loved York Hall baths because they could be themselves there, and join in with a vibrant community. New 'Spa etiquette' aims to restrict and manage people, commercialising and profiting from experiences that were previously shared, and free - in all sense of the word."

(Via Yorkhall : Message: Re: York Hall Turkish and Russian Baths - "Spa London" FYI - An Open Letter : .)

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A hornets' nest seems to be being angered in Bethnal Green that is preventing "relaxation and tranquillity" within the reopened Spa. There is particular scorn for the etiquette rules posted on the Spa London website. We haven't yet established which points are so unacceptable or why they are particularly unacceptable to residents of East London but we will follow it with interest.

"Its a load of bollocks - pretentious rubbish. The person / people who created this monstrosity hasn't got a clue how to run a spa. CJB." and "Do you think these guys have ever visited east London? I think they are having a larf!"

(Via York Hall Yahoo Group Yorkhall : Message: Re: [Yorkhall] York Hall "etiquette" on shoddy Spa London website: .)

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"Despite its location in a London borough where a third of under-16s are obese, its owner, Tower Hamlets council, was planning to close the hall, which houses two swimming pools and fitness classes.

Mark Gould Wednesday 03 March 2004" [The Guardian ]

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Councillor John Griffiths writes "As you may have seen on London Tonight news this evening, the Council agreed earlier this evening to award the new leisure contract for running leisure facilities throughout Tower Hamlets to Greenwich Leisure Ltd. This is a 15-year contract and is an arrangement which secures a ring-fenced £4.72m funding package for YH. The investment which will be made over the next 2 years is enough to undertake all the required maintenance and refurbishment work and to keep the facility open for at least the next 15 years.....more

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York Hall - Saved! Feb 2004