Councillors in North Yorkshire are backing a brand new campaign to create an outdoor tidal pool in Scarborough.
Children’s Corner, South Bay, has been identified as the preferred location for the pool, which would provide a safer sea swimming spot for visitors with improved accessibility. The pool would have sand flowing into it, a sheltered beach and a bathing area for children, and would join several tidal pools in the UK, including Bude Sea Pool in Cornwall and Margate’s Walpole Bay.
Children’s Corner offers stunning views across the beach, and already boasts stair access by the Spa and ramped access from The Clock Cafe.
The proposed design boasts a three-sided pool open to the top of the beach, with sand running into it to create a “fully accessible facility”. It also plans a 50m swimming area further out within a wider body of water for free swimming. A cast concrete ramp for easy entry and exit has also been considered.
Councillor Rich Maw said: “This idea began in the simplest of ways – with a letter from two local sea swimmers who asked me, ‘How do we build a swimming pool?’ That one question has grown into a meaningful conversation, and now, the foundations of a community-led and deliverable plan.
“Scarborough’s South and North Bays are already loved by sea swimmers year-round. Cold-water swimming is growing rapidly in popularity and for good reason.
“The health benefits are wide-ranging but, as we know, sea swimming also carries risks. Tides, currents, and cold-water shock make it inaccessible for many and potentially dangerous for some.”
Cold water swimming is a rapidly growing hobby across the UK, with Scarborough, in particular, home to a number of wild swimming groups.
Now that councillors have spoken in favour of the plans, the Scarborough Sea Swimming CIC will begin work on the next stages of development.
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[Featured image: Photo © Ian Capper (cc-by-sa/2.0)]
