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Which is London's Best Swimming Pool?

London Pools Campaign set out to find the best of London's 104 swimming pools. The idea came from a conversation about which was the best pool we had swum in - everyone had a suggestion - so we thought we would set some criteria and try to find out which were the best pools in London.

We advertised to people who took our newsletter and the ASA regional organisers. 90 people took part; they filled in a questionnaire with 77 questions including comments on the architecture, opening hours, attentiveness of lifeguards - and particularly the cleanliness of the water, the changing rooms and the rest of the building.

We visited each pool twice, except for pools which are intended primarily as leisure pools, which were visited once, as this is intended as a swimmer's survey - though on another occasion we would like to extend it to be a more complete exercise.

Since it took place over the winter, it was mostly restricted to indoor swimming.

We decided to give 3 awards:

1. Best Pool

Looked at the all-round facility - took in all the answers to all the questions - how many pools are there, how clean is it, how good is disabled access, how knowledgeable are the staff, does it have additional facilities like slides, a sauna, a gym and yoga classes.

2. Swimmers' Favourite

Focussing more on things like how often lane swimming is available, the cleanliness of the facility, the architecture, the atmosphere and friendliness of staff.

3. Best Borough

We averaged the marks for all the pools in a borough, then we added up how much swimming water there was in the borough and divided by the population.

The pools that came out best in each category we re-checked to make sure we agreed with the original questionnaires.

Word of caution

We would like to offer a health warning - these questionnaires were filled in by many different people with different ideas of what 'well maintained changing rooms?' might mean. Where 2 came back with radically different answers we re-checked, but a pool might be unlucky - first if it was checked by 2 very clean and tidy people and second if it happened to be visited twice just before it was cleaned after a big kid's session. If any pool feels like it has been hard done by in our questionnaire, we would be happy to go and visit again - please get in touch.

Things we wished we'd done differently

We wished we asked for the max depth of the water as many swimmers mention this as something they look for The question about lane swimming - we just asked how often lane swimming available - this meant a pool scored high if it left just one lane available all the time, though obviously this would be inadequate at peak times

Things we marked pools down for:

Dirt - we had a section 'what is the worst thing about this pool' and over and over again people said 'the cleanliness of the changing rooms and toilets'. Some pools are so old and run down it is really difficult to make them look and feel clean; cholorine stains the floors and the seats, lockers have lost keys, changing cubicles have lost locks and hinges, shower heads are blocked. But some pools just were dirty.

Lack of lane swimming and confusing time tabling. The surveyors really complained about how they often turned up to swim to find they couldn't go in or that there was just one crowded lane available. We tried to make sure that our swimmers' favourite pools were ones which had the maximum of lane swimming available.

Chlorine levels - can we really not work out how to keep pools clean and hygienic without high levels of chlorine?

Cold changing rooms (this was largely a winter survey!) and too warm swimming water

Food: - swimming makes you hungry, over and over again the surveyors, particularly those with children, complained about chocolate and bubble gum machines sited at the exit of every pool. A few pools were really praised for their cafes - in particular Queen Mother Centre in Victoria, East Ham Baths and Pool on the Parks in Richmond - but these are very very few.

Things we marked pools up for:

Clear water

Extra length - a standard pool is 25m - swimmers really appreciate the pools that are 33m - the extra few yards make a difference to the swim

Friendly and helpful staff - mentioned and appreciated over and over again

Architecture - lots of praise for pools with vaulted roofs like Ilford, Acton and Ironmonger row - and generally where a building is interesting and stylish it was appreciated. We included this criteria in both our swimmers' favourite and best pool scores.

Light and airy pool halls

Diving facilities - getting rare

Public transport - some pools very inaccessible - we marked them up for having good transport links.

Debatable points

Mixed sex changing villages - very mixed feelings about these - clearly good for families, carers, school swimming, but lots of people expressed strong dislike of them and avoided pools where this was the only option.

Temperature of water - far more often complaints that the water is too warm than too cold - again facilities won through when they had different pools (with different heating systems) for different functions - IE baby pool is warm, training pool is medium, and pool for lane swimming is cooler.

Biggest shock

A pool with no showers! Chafford pool in Rainham.

Pools which could be fabulous

Several pools where people really appreciated the architecture and the basic facilities and said with investment, this pool could be fabulous - examples Dagenham which has big diving area, 33m pool, balcony and vaulted roof - one detective said 'clear water and the diving area makes it 25m across the width at one point'

Acton - one of our detectives said "Best water I've swum in, beautifully clearÉ and sunshine from overhead glass roof. Astonishing it's so clean given there are poolside cubicles so lots of foot traffic".

Arches in Greenwich - charming 1930's pool with walk-around balcony - but run down.

Bad Buildings - Good Pools

There are many examples of this - here are a selection from around London

Lamorbey in Bexley - clearly a well run pool, good water, diving facility - but it's in a old cinema, has no disabled access, the changing rooms are in a corridor and there are plans to knock it down, so in the meantime, the staff struggle on.

Heston in Hounslow - great pool, really good local pool, very friendly helpful staff, but the building is like a bunker - it's unwelcoming and the changing rooms are made of raw breezeblocks

Seven Islands pool - 33m pool - good water, good community pool - but the building is in a complete state.

Special mentions

Aspire [link]- the national disability centre

Leyton Leisure Lagoon [link]- runs 8 packed women-only sessions a week mainly aimed at local muslim population

Waterfront Centre in Greenwich [link] - leisure pool - like Centre Parks - must be the biggest slide in London?

The 2 fabulous lidos that are open all year - Tooting (cold water, 100m long) and Hampton (heated outdoor pool, run by local community group)

Pools on Death Row

So many pools are under threat - some for good reason, some not. Many swimmers question the need to keep knocking down old facilities to build new when the old are only bad because often they have been neglected for many years. Often the old pools are architectural gems, however some pools are beyond redemption and it is good that a local authority is looking to replace them.

All these pools surveyors reported as having question marks over their future, once a pool's future is uncertain, investment usually stops completely while decisions are made.

• Ladywell
• Forest Hill
• Dagenham
• Ilford
• Fulwell Cross
• Lamorbey
• Acton
• Northolt Swimarama
• Streatham
• South Norwood
• Arches in Greenwich
• Heston
• Seven Island - apparently has subsidence
• Brixton Recreation Centre
• Clapham Baths
• Eltham Baths
• Edmonton
• Hayes

Overall message from Survey

The overall message from the survey is that swimmers rated about a third of London's pools as 'good'. Most of the rest are either leisure pools, so not really aimed at swimmers or pools that really need investment.

More than bad pools we found pools where heroic staff are battling with an impossible building to provide a good community leisure facility.

Our Message

If the government wants the nation to be healthy, investment in pools would be a good start - both improving the good ones we have, and replacing bad ones and building new pools. People are unlikely to start going swimming if their local pool is cold, dirty, packed and has unpredictable opening hours.