Extended Opening Hours Project At Ross-shire Leisure Centre A Success

In November 2007, thanks to external funding from Youthlink Scotland, The Highland Council was able to extend the weekend opening hours at Dingwall Leisure Centre and give local young people the chance to take part in a wide range of sporting activities during winter weekends.

Funding allowed the opening hours to extend from 9.30pm to 10.30pm on a Friday night and from 4.30pm to 9.30pm on Saturday evenings.  Although anyone from the public could take advantage of these extended hours, the main focus was on providing local youngsters with a chance to get active, meet new friends and make the most of their leisure time.

To encourage as many young people to come along as possible, a scheme was developed with Young Scot to provide free vouchers for public transport to the Leisure Centre from the outlying villages.

Run by leisure staff and the Council’s local Youth Development Officers, the project has proved to be a great success and popular with young people, with over 1,000 attending over the weeks.  Activities have included a special “Teen hour” in the gym with training on how to use the gym equipment, swimming and sports in the games halls.

Last Saturday (5 April), the final session, took place and a good turn out of young people came along to take part.

Youth Development Officers Lindsay McGarry and Fiona Richardson said: “We are really pleased with the outcome of the project, the high numbers indicate that young people really enjoyed using the facility.  Although this is the last week, we hope that this will be able to take place again in the future.”

The Council’s Youth Development team are now making plans to run a summer activity programme for local young people over the school holiday period.