Residents have been waiting over a year for some repairs to be carried out at an Amersham leisure centre in a situation branded ‘ridiculous’.

The Chilterns Lifestyle Centre, which is managed by Everyone Active, has several ongoing external maintenance issues, according to regular visitors of the site.

These include an out of order parking machine at the car park entrance and a missing bench that was broken and completely removed from the rear of the centre.

The bench is one of the most longstanding issues at the sports hub, having been reported to Buckinghamshire Council in June 2023.

An email from a council leisure manager at that time read: “A quote for the repair the damaged bench at the entrance is being sought and a repair will be undertaken upon receipt.”

This week, a resident complained that the bench and parking machine were still broken, saying: “This timescale is clearly ridiculous and totally unacceptable.”

Buckinghamshire Council opened the Chilterns Lifestyle Centre to much fanfare in December 2021, before celebrating its one-year anniversary in an event with British Olympic silver medallist Colin Jackson a year later.

The £36 million sports hub features a 25m swimming pool, gym, sports hall, squash courts, climbing wall and other facilities, and receives one million visits per year.

However, a resident who regularly visits the centre, suggested that the council could not provide enough funding to manage it.

He said: “Unfortunately, it would seem that although £30m-plus could be found to carry out this extravagant project, insufficient finances and resources were allowed to properly maintain and repair it.

“It is especially galling that now that Amersham Town Council have made such a wonderful job of improving the main planting bed outside the main entrance, that behind it lurks a broken bench at the main footpath to the centre.”

He added: “Please can something be done about this urgently, as otherwise I fear for the future of the Lifestyle Centre and its environs.”

One of the other problems reported outside the leisure centre is that some plants, shrubs and trees in planting beds have died, while weeds have become overgrown.

Contractor’s barriers and overflowing waste skips in the car park are also said to have been left at the site for long periods.

Clive Harriss, the council’s cabinet member for culture and leisure claimed that the external planted areas had suffered both drought and exceptional rainfall and so could not be immediately addressed.

He said: “Much of the damage described was due to vandalism and it is difficult to allow for unexpected maintenance of that nature.

“Whilst we claim on insurance and seek replacements, we also regularly review and investigate more robust street furniture as a preventative measure when appropriate.

“In a world where supply is on a ‘just in time’ basis, suppliers do not stockpile items as they did in the 1980s and 1990s and orders now must be manufactured.”

The council said Chilterns Lifestyle Centre Council and Everyone Active ‘believe we are providing a good service in the main’, including regular maintenance, such as repairing vandalised bike shelters and removing graffiti and damaged trees.

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