The 1970s grade II-listed Richard Dunn Sports Centre could make history after narrowly avoiding demolition
Ian Chalk Architects and Twentieth Century Society (C20) have proposed the world’s first permanent indoor and outdoor Olympic level skate facility in Bradford.
The Dunn would repurpose the currently abandoned 1970s grade II-listed Richard Dunn Sports centre, named after the Bradford-born boxer who fought Muhammad Ali for the Heavyweight Championship of the World in 1976.
The skate and outdoor sports centre would combine street and park style courses, providing different terrains and obstacles as well as spectator and competitor facilities.
A 555sq m park style concrete bowl that follows the contours of the original leisure pool and a 1475sq m street style arena that transitions from the indoor sports hall area to a new outdoor course are included in the plans.
Other areas would be remodelled with climbing walls, a cafe and studio suites.
Inspired by Kenzo Tange’s 1964 Tokyo Olympics gymnasium, the ‘big-top’ roofed building was one of the earliest UK projects to use Computer Aided Design (CAD).
Faced with rising maintenance and energy costs, the sports centre permanently closed in 2019 but was earmarked for redevelopment by owners Bradford City Council. The site was placed on stand-by in 2020 as a temporary mortuary facility during the Covid-19 pandemic.
When faced with imminent demolition, C20 submitted a listing application for the building in late 2021, and in April 2022 it became one of the first leisure centres of its type to be nationally listed.
Local newspaper the Telegraph & Argus ran a poll on how the building should be redeveloped following news of its grade II listing. Of the nearly 3000 responses, the most popular was to turn the derelict sports centre into a skatepark.
Skateboard GB – the national governing body for skateboarding - confirmed that the city lacks suitable facilities. Bradford is England’s seventh largest local authority, yet there are only three skateparks within the wider facility, all of which are outdoors and would be classified as micro sized (less than 150sq m).
Bradford is Britain’s youngest city, with 29% of the population being under 20 and will become UK City of Culure in 2025.
Since closing its doors, the sports centre has been the target of vandalism and arson attacks and was even used as a dystopian filming location for Danny Boyle’s upcoming zombie apocalypse feature 28 Years Later.
Richard Dunn Sports Centre is one of four sites listed as a result of C20 Society’s ongoing Leisure Centres Campaign, launched in 2022. A report commissioned by Swim England in September 2021 estimated that 40% of the country’s public pools could be forced to close by 2030 due to restricted local authority budgets, global chlorine shortages and soaring energy costs.
No comments yet