Public meeting held over plans for Olympic-size swimming pool
The site is currently made up of green land next to a railway and playing fields next to Nelson Primary School in Vincent Street, Ladywood.
Coun Ward added: “It is highlighted in the council’s own Nature Conservation Strategy as a wildlife area which should be preserved for future generations to enjoy.
“If we can just ignore that it makes you wonder was sort of protection this Strategy offers for wildlife. If we are going to give protection it has to be meaningful.”
Planning committee chairman Peter Douglas Osborn said: “This is a valid point. There is a considerable ecological downside to this development. But there is an upside with the leisure provision and facilities. That is a judgement we will have to make.”
He promised that once the full planning application is submitted that the committee would hold a full large scale public meeting to ensure that the views of local residents and swimmers are listened to.
Clive Dutton, in one of his last acts as director of planning and regeneration for Birmingham, urged the committee to deal with the application quickly to ensure the pool is ready for the 2012 Olympics.
He said: “There is a need for a 50 metre pool and specialised diving facility in Birmingham and this will fill that gap with some panache and become a facility for the whole region. It will be Birmingham’s legacy from the 2012 Olympics. That Birmingham does not have a facility of this size is pretty remarkable. Paris has nine.”
