Calls for planned therapy pool to be affordable

The therapy complex with clinical care, patient accommodation and parking has been approved by the city council

A woman left "bedbound" by the closure of a hydrotherapy pool says she hopes a planned new multi-million pound facility will be affordable and accessible.

Peterborough City Council has agreed proposals for a new privately-run therapy complex at the Thistlemoor Medical Centre on Lincoln Road in Millfield.

Planners believe the site, which is likely to take about 15 months to build, will plug a gap left after the closure of the St. George's Hydrotherapy Pool in 2022.

Tracey Smeeton said the loss of St George's forced people to travel further, pay more - or stop hydrotherapy all together.

"Fingers crossed I will have something left of me by then because I am bedbound now," Ms Smeeton told BBC Radio Cambridgeshire.

"I hope not to lose too much more [mobility] but it is hard when you can't exercise on dry land."

Dr Neil Modha said to help reduce the cost for pool users, green heat sources would be used

A doctor from the centre said that, at the moment, children from Peterborough had to travel to Stamford, Lincolnshire, for hydrotherapy, "so it would be great for the new centre to be used by the NHS for the NHS".

Dr Neil Modha said to help reduce the cost for pool users, green heat sources, such as solar panels, would be used to lower the running cost of heating the water.

"In many ways it doesn't make sense financially to build this," he said, "but it is for the community and for the residents to be more enabled in their lives.

"We don't want a pool that's not used. Our desire is that people who need it the most can use it."

The original plans for the heath hub have been changed to have the pool on the ground floor to make it more accessible.

Dr Modha told the BBC the pool would be "state of the art" and larger than the St George's facility.

The site as a whole could include an endoscopy unit, minor operative department, rehabilitation section, and patient accommodation.