Le Blanc’s swimming pools are the talk of the town. On one side, the so-called summer swimming pool, which will not reopen this season. On the other, the so-called winter swimming pool, that of the Ménigoutes, which will remain open longer to compensate for the closure of the first… but where the water temperature will drop by two degrees.
Decline in attendance and dilapidation in the summer swimming pool
The summer pool at Le Blanc is an institution. Opened in 1969, generations of Blancos have swum there. But for several years, attendance drops. “We averaged details Jérôme Penin, sports assistant at the town hall of Le Blanc. “Between 90 and 100 cubic meters of water are consumed daily in this pool. And over the last two summers, certainly marked by the health situation and bad weather, there were on average eight swimmers per day.
The elected official puts forward one of the campaign arguments which led to the election of the new mayor in 2020, Gilles Lherpinière, that of the municipal debt reduction : “The pool costs between 200,000 and 230,000 euros per year, so it’s complicated” says the assistant.
Another element, the dilapidation of this 53-year-old swimming pool, especially in boiler rooms. To ensure a way to swim”associations, schools and users“, the Ménigouttes swimming pool will therefore play extra time.
Explosion of costs at the Ménigouttes swimming pool
But in this covered basin, there too there will be change. The water temperature will drop from 27 to 25°C. The fault this time with the sharp rise in energy prices. “In the first quarter of 2021, we paid around 7,000 euros to heat the pool. In the first quarter of 2022, we paid 29,000 euros” sighs Jérôme Penin. An increase of more than 300%
“If we continue like this, it will cost around 84,000 euros over the year”
One degree less in the water corresponds to an energy saving of 7%. “The drop to 25 degrees will allow us to save between 4,000 and 6,000 euros.” The choice of 25°C was chosen according to the prescriptions of both the Indre swimming committee and the French Swimming Federation.
An intercommunal swimming pool?
The town hall of Le Blanc has asked the municipalities and communities of municipalities whose schools attend this Ménigouttes basin to finance the two missing degrees. “I’m hopeful, and I think it’s going to happen“says Jérôme Penin.
Because the swimming pools of Le Blanc are frequented by both Blancois, but also swimmers from neighboring towns, or even neighboring departments. “We have people from Béthines, La Trimouille (Vienna), from Yzeures-sur-Creuse (Indre-et-Loire)…” indicates the chosen one.
Negotiations are underway to try to create an intermunicipal syndicatebringing together in particular the community of communes Brenne-Val de Creuse and that of Marche Occitane-Val d’Anglin, in order to have the budgets necessary for the repair of the summer swimming pool, or to create an intercommunal swimming pool.
Swimming on the banks of the Creuse
Another track studied by the town hall, that of a kind of… Le Blanc-Plage. In the summer of 2023, access to the Creuse will be developed at the foot of Camping du Blanc, in order to create a beach. The project should have seen the light of day this year, but could not be completed in time due to “administrative delays.“