Why Bransbury Park

Bransbury Park is a great location for a new hub for sports, swimming, and healthcare. Already home to football facilities, and a busy community centre, it is on several bus routes and is within walking distance of over 35,000 residents.

It’s also near five schools, who will be able to take advantage of the new learner pool. Businesses on Eastney Road will also benefit from increased numbers of visitors, boosting the local economy.

You can view a map showing the location of the new leisure centre. It includes walking and cycling times, bus routes and the location of local schools.

You can also view a map here showing the population within 1.5km of the proposed sites. This shows the Bransbury Park leisure centre (35,796), and the Eastney Swimming Pool site (17,933).

We’ve put this helpful video together to show how, with your input, we came to decide on Bransbury Park.

Our commitments

• We’re keeping our pledge to deliver a new 25m x 4 lane pool and learner pool, with supporting gym and studios so the centre can operate with minimal financial support.
• A new GP surgery will be built at a cost of £1.5m. Costs will be recovered through rent.
• Eastney pool has permanently closed and has been demolished. A consultation on the future use of the site took place in summer 2025. Find out more about the Eastney watersports site.
• The new facility is not intended to provide a replacement for Wimbledon Park Sports Centre. We now intend to keep Wimbledon Park Sports Centre open for another decade, following investment from BH Live and the council.
• The council intends to undertake a preliminary assessment of indoor sports facilities in the city to include location, availability, accessibility, condition and cost in 2025 to determine the overall need for these facilities.

What has already been done

• Planning permission was unanimously approved by members of Portsmouth City Council’s planning committee on 18 December 2024. Construction began in early 2026.
• We’ve continued to consult with residents on the proposals to make sure our plans meet the needs of as many people as possible.
• In a city-wide sports and leisure facilities consultation in winter 2020, 63% of respondents ‘agreed’ or ‘strongly agreed’ with opening a new leisure centre in the southeast of the city.
• More consultation was held in early 2021, and 78% of respondents said they were likely to visit a new physical activity and community hub at Bransbury Park.

View the past consultation and engagement results:

• Bransbury Park leisure centre design consultation March 2023
• Bransbury Park community facilities survey December 2022
• Engagement event March 2022
• Sport and leisure users consultation 2021
• Sport and leisure facilities consultation 2020
• Support for new leisure centre at Bransbury Park 2020

More information

An independent report was commissioned to assess the suitability of several sites across the city for a new activity hub for the south-eastern part of the city.

Contact us

You can contact the team at bransburypark@portsmouthcc.gov.uk.