£9.2m Leys swimming pool complex opens

Leys Pools and Leisure Centre in Oxford has an eight lane, 25m (82ft) competition-standard swimming pool

A £9.2m swimming pool complex that replaces a leisure centre campaigners failed to save has opened to swimmers.

Leys Pools and Leisure Centre in Oxford has an eight lane, 25m (82ft) competition-standard swimming pool with moveable floor and a teaching pool.

It replaces the city's Temple Cowley Pools, which Oxford City Council decided to sell for housing despite a long-running campaign to save it.

An official opening will be held on 24 January.

There is also a refurbished gym, two studios for exercise classes, a refurbished sports hall and indoor cycling studio at the new leisure complex.

Construction work on the complex began in 2013 after a legal bid to protect the land on which it was being built was abandoned.

Residents in Blackbird Leys had taken Oxfordshire County Council to the High Court over its refusal to award land next to Blackbird Leys Leisure Centre Town Green status.

Temple Cowley Pools, one and a half miles away from the new complex, was closed in December after Oxford Council City accepted a £3.5m offer from developer Catalyst Housing.