LEISURE
HOW CAN DESIGN MAKE LEISURE CENTRES MORE INCLUSIVE? Sport England estimates that inactivity causes one-in-six deaths and costs the NHS approximately £1bn per year. With UK sport and leisure facilities now reopening their doors, we need to consider who is using these facilities and what barriers they face. Architects, a leading G T3architecture firm specialising in sports and leisure, has undertaken a research piece as part of its Inclusive Design series to dig deeper into the issues people face when visiting leisure centres. “As people architects, we believe that a fundamental part of our role is understanding, anticipating and designing for the needs of our users,” says Paul Reed, Associate Director and Head of Sports and Leisure at GT3. “This means not only ensuring existing, active users are engaged, but also creating exciting, beautiful and wellbalanced facilities to support under-represented groups and demographics who don’t currently feel catered for at sports and leisure facilities. At present, leisure centres only cater for 16% of the population, so these issues need to be addressed if we are to get more people active. “Our Inclusive Design series forms part of a wider research and development push led by a team of architects, interior designers and engagement
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specialists. For our first project, we looked specifically at caregivers of young children – this was defined as any adult who had experience taking a young child to a leisure centre. “We discovered that 85% of caregivers surveyed find it incredibly difficult to deal with the challenges of a leisure centre – such as where to put a child while you get changed or how to get into the pool safely if your child cannot stand by themselves – particularly when alone. “59% of people surveyed said they are usually the only adult responsible for their child or children during a visit and the word ‘stressful’ was used frequently, with caregivers feeling that the experience is more difficult than they would like. “Encouragingly, 58% of people surveyed would like to visit a leisure centre more often. We believe that if facilities were designed with caregivers in mind, they would use the facilities more, increasing both their own and their children’s exposure to water and/or fitness activities.”
