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Economic Development

Stechford Cascades water slides will be lost in £36m pool overhaul

Pool is one of six new council-owned sites to be built in the city which will be run by private operators

(Image: Streeter Lecka/Getty Images)

Birmingham's famous Stechford Cascades water slides are likely to be lost when the pool is replaced as part of a

Stechford Cascades is one of six new council-owned pools being built in Birmingham and they will, along with other existing sports facilities, be run by private operators under a 15-year contract.

But minimum specifications for the new pool do not include slides, water falls, bubble machines and a walk in 'beach' which attract many visitors to the facility.

Instead, the selected contractor, which is to build the new leisure centre on the Station Road car park ready to open in April 2017, will only have to provide a 25-metre pool, a learner pool, a gym, sports hall, community room and café.

Coun Sue Anderson (Lib Dem, Sheldon), chairman of the Yardley district committee, said there were also concerns over the loss of a 200-seat spectator area as the pool had been used for schools competitions.

"School competitions have been there for years and years, but now there are just places for 40 spectators to look through the glass from the café area.

"We have already accepted the cascades will have to go," she said, explaining that staffing of the slides was expensive.

"So it will no longer be called the cascades."