Countdown begins to new Heywood Sports Village

The new Heywood Sports Village opens on Monday 20 September

The new £10.3 million Heywood Sports Village is now only weeks away from completion. It will open to the public for the first time on Monday 20 September.

Cabinet Member for Environment and Leisure, Councillor David Clayton, said it is the latest phase in the council and Link4Life’s £35m investment in improving leisure facilities in the borough: “This will bring great benefits for the people of Heywood in terms of health, improved environment and quality of life.

"The council, with our partners Link4Life and Heywood NDC have worked hard to get this much needed investment in Heywood, securing £5.5m in external funding from Sport England and the Football Foundation.

"Heywood Sports Village will offer new and improved leisure facilities including two swimming pools, a larger fitness suite, new dance and movement studios, a SHOKK youth gym, community rooms and improved sports pitches.” 

“I am delighted that we are coming to the end of the construction programme and getting ready for opening the building,” Added Councillor Clayton.

A spokesperson for Rochdale Borough Council said that the contractor will officially hand over the building to the council at the beginning of August and the process of staff training and fitting out the centre will then begin: “Demolition of Gaskell Pool will start at the beginning of August and then the final task will be the completion of external landscaping and car park. The Jack Talbot Sports Hall will remain unaffected by the work and will remain open for use of the sports hall, all weather pitch and gym until the Village opens in September.”

Councillor McCarthy, Chair of Heywood Township said: “This new Sports Village will give Heywood residents some of the best and most modern facilities available in the region. I am pleased to announce the improved opening hours for the centre … with weekday early opening, later evenings and longer hours at weekends.”

Special arrangements will be made to help get local people to other pools in the meantime, with a council funded bus shuttle service especially for Heywood residents. The service will be available seven days a week, from 2 August to the end of the summer holiday. There will be a bus that leaves from the existing Heywood Sports Complex that will travel round the borough, calling at pools in Rochdale, Castleton and Middleton. The round trip will take approximately an hour to complete and will give people the chance to return on a later bus.

Full details of the summer pool programme and bus timetable will be available from Heywood Sports Complex and the Phoenix Centre by the end of June and will also be online at www.link4life.org/heywoodvillage

The existing Gaskell Pool will be open and running a full holiday programme of activities until the end of July. Its final day of operation will be Saturday 31 July. More information about the new sports, swimming and arts activities that will be coming to the Heywood Sports Village from September will also be announced this summer.