The Royal Commonwealth Pool (RCP), aka "the Commie", is a broad, squarish building in the Newington area to the South of the City. The building, with its Olympic sized pool housed within, was originally completed in time for the 1970 Commonwealth Games and was used again in the 1986 Games.
The A-listed building re-opened to the public on 21 March 2012 following a two and a half year, £37m refurbishment by GRAHAM Construction making it one of the best aquatic facilities in the UK.
The revamped pool, which is run by an arm of the Council, Edinburgh Leisure, includes:
- a 50m, eight-lane pool for community and specialist swimming use with a boom capable of subdividing the pool into two areas
- a re-orientated 25m diving pool up to 5m deep with moveable floor which can be used for swimming when not in use for diving
- a dry dive facility including trampoline and springboards to allow divers to practise out of the pool
- a 25m pool with moveable floor to accommodate warm-up provision, swimming lessons and informal play utilising pool toys
- new dry soft play facilities
- a refurbished and expanded gym and fitness studios
- a refurbished and redesigned changing village, meeting and conference rooms
- 821 seats on seating deck
- 25,000m² floor area
The RCP will host the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games diving events and, next summer, the British Olympic swimming squad have elected to hold their final training camp there ahead of the London Games.