Ferry Swimming Pool

I took out annual membership of the Ferry Leisure Centre in March 2025 and have visited its gym most days. The general standard of the facilities is good (in particular, I like the 8 e-gym machines, which are accessed by logging in with an app that tracks your progress and remembers the settings for each machine). At about £380 for a year's membership I also think it's pretty good value for money. However, the centre as a whole is badly let down by its management, which is completely unresponsive to complaints about items requiring maintenance or repair. This includes such vital items as the air conditioning in the gym, half of which has been inoperative for about a month. What started off as minor annoyances have therefore become major frustrations as repeated reminders of even such small issues as a loose toilet seat which would only take about 3 minutes with a spanner to fix are persistently ignored. Three separate individuals at the reception desk told me they would sort that problem out themselves, and all of them broke their undertaking. Other things that could be improved are the lack of air conditioning in corridors and changing rooms, and the fact that there is only one urinal plus one toilet cubicle in the men's dry changing room. I also dislike the fact that music I have not chosen is often being pumped out over the gym's PA system instead of having silence. Half the users are trying to listen to their own headphones while exercising, and it must surely be a nuisance to them too to have to try to mentally shut out the noise from the PA system. I haven't yet used the pool (25 metres, wide lanes), but it looks to be in excellent condition. The pool's shower area is unisex and lacks privacy for both showing and changing. The men's dry changing room also has showers, but the fact that swimmers who have exited the pool would need to use the showers in the men's dry changing room if they wanted to shower without their costumes on strikes me as pretty awkward. I assume that female swimmers would face a similar problem. It is the poor management of the leisure centre that induces me to give the facility only two stars, otherwise I would have given it four stars. An upgrade of the changing and toilet facilities would be required for me to give it five stars.

I took out annual membership of the Ferry Leisure Centre in March 2025 and have visited its gym most days. The general standard of the facilities is good (in particular, I like the 8 e-gym machines, which are accessed by logging in with an app that tracks your progress and remembers the settings for each machine). At about £380 for a year's membership I also think it's pretty good value for money. However, the centre as a whole is badly let down by its management, which is completely unresponsive to complaints about items requiring maintenance or repair. This includes such vital items as the air conditioning in the gym, half of which has been inoperative for about a month. What started off as minor annoyances have therefore become major frustrations as repeated reminders of even such small issues as a loose toilet seat which would only take about 3 minutes with a spanner to fix are persistently ignored. Three separate individuals at the reception desk told me they would sort that problem out themselves, and all of them broke their undertaking. Other things that could be improved are the lack of air conditioning in corridors and changing rooms, and the fact that there is only one urinal plus one toilet cubicle in the men's dry changing room. I also dislike the fact that music I have not chosen is often being pumped out over the gym's PA system instead of having silence. Half the users are trying to listen to their own headphones while exercising, and it must surely be a nuisance to them too to have to try to mentally shut out the noise from the PA system. I haven't yet used the pool (25 metres, wide lanes), but it looks to be in excellent condition. The pool's shower area is unisex and lacks privacy for both showing and changing. The men's dry changing room also has showers, but the fact that swimmers who have exited the pool would need to use the showers in the men's dry changing room if they wanted to shower without their costumes on strikes me as pretty awkward. I assume that female swimmers would face a similar problem. It is the poor management of the leisure centre that induces me to give the facility only two stars, otherwise I would have given it four stars. An upgrade of the changing and toilet facilities would be required for me to give it five stars.

The swimming pool was nice. My 2-stars review is because the bathrooms/changing rooms were AWFUL. Smelly and old. It is obvious that the cleaning is not done regularly, which is essential for swimming pool changing rooms. A really disgusting and unpleasant experience. It is a shame because the pool was actually good, but the lack of maintenance and hygiene of their changing rooms are a dealbreaker for me. I am not coming back.