Oldham Community Leisure (OCL) has launched its second new leisure facility in a matter of months – the £15m Oldham Leisure Centre.

The new site follows swiftly on from the recent opening of Royton Leisure Centre and again saw operator OCL work in partnership Oldham Council, constructor Willmott Dixon and GT Architects to bring the project to fruition.

Along with Glodwick Pool, the previous Oldham Sports Centre has now closed for the final time – with the site included in plans for further town centre regeneration.

As for the new site, Oldham will now have the capability to hold regional and televised competitions thanks to the enhanced facilities; which include a 25m (82ft), eight-lane swimming pool of county-level standard, an 80-station gym supplied by Technogym, two dance studios and a bespoke indoor cycling studio. There is also an eight-court sports hall with seating for more than 500 spectators, an indoor bowls arena, café and ample free car parking.

“We made a commitment following the London Olympics that we would provide facilities that would improve the health and wellbeing of our residents,” said Oldham Council deputy leader Jean Stretton.

“We also pledged that the new facilities would create local jobs and a large number of residents and local firms have been involved in their construction.”

The new centre also follows Royton in featuring a unique access-control system to monitor pool usage. Specially developed for OCL by Gladstone, the system collects data via a mounted touch-screen at reception turnstiles and is one of several software solutions supplied by Gladstone to the site.