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The End of Diving in London ??
14th November 2003
A meeting tonight heard that the Crystal Palace National Sports Centre is to close in March 2004. A dismayed meeting heard that there are no plans to refurbish the facility and that following the withdrawal of Sport England from the facility, Bromley Council will be unable to fund the continuing use of Crystal Palace as a High Performance Centre. Failing funding being made available to both refurbish the facility and to allow its continual use as a major regional sports centre, Crystal Palace will close completely on the 24th March next year.
This would mean that there would be no highboard diving facility in the South East of England at all, and London would then have no ability to run any events in diving, swimming or athletics at any level until the Olympics in 2012.
I would hesitate to speculate on the attitude of the IOC on a bid from a city that had no major facility for sport at all when the bid was submitted.
For diving specificly, the loss of Crystal Palace would prove catastrophic: it would leave the South East with no facility at all, the nearest being Southampton and Sheffield, the new Greater London, Eastern and South Eastern regions would have no facility at all for highboard or synchro diving, and no pool that could host National level championships.
If London is serious about bidding for the Olympics, then we must retain facilities such as Crystal Palace: it should be being refurbished or rebuilt, not being closed for good.
John Whitby
Chief Executive
G B Diving Federation