THE cost of building a new swimming pool on an Oxford estate could be as much as £8m.

Oxford City Council has stated its case for the first time for a new city swimming pool, which would be built next to Blackbird Leys Leisure Centre, saying it is “crucial” the facility is built in the next three years.

The pool, which it is estimated would cost between £5.5m and £8m to build, would partly be funded by closing the ageing Temple Cowley and Blackbird Leys swimming pools.

The remaining costs would met by borrowing.

Official papers released this week detailed just how out-of-date some of the city’s current frontline leisure facilities are – and how they would need millions of pounds ploughed into them to bring them up to scratch.

Oxford City Council’s head of leisure Hagan Lewisman said: “Both Temple Cowley Pool and Blackbird Leys Pool are very energy-inefficient and have a significant carbon footprint.

“There is a need to improve the quality of leisure facilities within the city.

“The council’s vision is for a world-class Oxford, but neither Temple Cowley Pool or Blackbird Leys Pool can meet this vision.

“Both facilities are over 25 years old and are showing serious signs of age, both visually and structurally.

“They would need a minimum of £2.6m invested in both of them to meet the maintenance backlog (and) these works would result in no visible improvement to the customer.”

The council wants the new pool – which would include a general swimming pool and an eight-lane competition pool – opened in time for the London Olympics in 2012.

Fusion, the independent trust which currently runs civic leisure facilities in Oxford, would be responsible for overseeing the project and contributing towards its cost.

City council leader Bob Price said: “We have reached a stage where we would have to invest a lot of money in Temple Cowley Pool or develop something that is better and more effective.

“The Blackbird Leys site is a crucial part of the city’s leisure offering for the next decade. We don’t have a problem in accessing finance, or with the site, and I can’t believe that, even with the Olympics, there is not going to be some supplier around to build it.

“It’s all looking at this stage as if it can be delivered.”

Last month, an online petition was set up to save Temple Cowley Pool.

Steve Goddard, the Liberal Democrat prospective Parliamentary candidate for Oxford East, said: “Placing all its eggs in one basket, with a multi-million-pound pool in Blackbird Leys, is short-sighted in the extreme and smacks of an ambition to raise money from selling off the land Temple Cowley Pool occupies.

“The most sensible idea would be to combine a swimming pool and ice rink in the Temple Cowley area – and improve the Blackbird Leys Pool.”