LDRSAfter a long three-year wait, Bucksburn Pool has finally reopened its doors to swimmers across Aberdeen.
The popular and much missed facility was forced to shut following council budget cuts, but campaigners successfully fought hard to save it from being closed forever.
Aberdeen City Council spent £2.1m renovating the popular facility ahead of the doors opening once again.
Assistant operations manager Grant McKnight, who had been working since the doors opened at 6am, said: “We had a public lane session this morning and there was a really good turnout for that.
“We’ve had a second lane session since and in-between we had adult and baby lessons, it’s been quite a busy day for the first day back in business.”
But he admitted staff had been working behind the scenes dealing with “little teething problems here and there” but nothing major that they couldn’t deal with.
“Everybody seems to be having a good time, they are enjoying the facility and they really like what we’ve done,” Mr McKnight adds.
“We’ve had a lot of good feedback so far, they are really quite impressed with the way the facility looks.
“There was about 20 people waiting outside the door earlier.
“The lane sessions we can only have 30 people at a time, once we have our public sessions where the whole pool is in operation we can have up to 70 people.
“Hopefully it will be like before it closed three years ago when the queue used to be right up to the kerb at the back of the car park,” he says with a smile.
Nearby, mum Alix Hay was sat waiting for the afternoon public session to get under way with her two daughters Kayleigh, eight, and Lottie, three.
The family used to live in Bucksburn and regularly visited the pool, however they moved to Garthdee two years ago.
But after hearing it was reopening, they couldn’t miss out on visiting their favourite facility once again.
Alix explained they had visited other pools in the city, but Bucksburn held a special place in their hearts.
“We wanted to come back and see what had been done because we really liked this pool, we used to come every week,” she said.
The day was extra special as it was Lottie’s first time visiting the pool.
Alix added: “We took two buses to get here but it will be very worth it, from what we’ve seen so far it’s very nice and fresh.
“There was a lot of effort put into saving the pool so I’m glad it was reopened in the end.
Duty manager Ciaran Hall said he was “really excited” to see the facility up and running again.
He learned to swim at Bucksburn, so coming to work here was a “full circle moment”.
He said: “I did my baby lessons and then normal swimming lessons here, then after that I joined the club so I was here for 18 years before it shut.
“As soon as I knew it was going to open I put my name forward and said, “Please can I come back?’.”
Ciaran is working at the pool on a temporary contract over the summer, before returning to university in September.
However, he hopes to become a regular face at the facility.
“I’m up once a month anyway so I’ll see if I can pick up shifts,” he explains.
Looking at the growing queue of people at the front door, he adds: “It will be a busy day but I prefer it like that.”
One of the swimmers lucky enough to visit the “brilliant” pool on opening day was music instructor Conall McKay.
“It’s brilliant and it looks really good,” he said.
“I used to come here before it closed and I’ve missed it badly.”
Mr McKay stayed for the entire afternoon lane session and admitted the experience has left him considering taking out a membership for the pool.
He explained: “I’m trying to get my eldest son to do the same, my younger son already has a sports membership for the gym.
“I hope to keep using the pool going forward and hope it stays open this time.”
“I’ll try to visit once or twice a week and see if I can increase that, I’ll see how things go.”
As the afternoon lane session comes to an end, a queue of eager swimmers quickly forms outside ahead of the public session.
Demand is so fierce, the pool reaches capacity in just four minutes.
But despite this, the reopening of the clearly beloved Bucksburn Pool seems to have been a success overall.
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