The Newcastle Ocean Baths are set to re-open in a week with a day finally set for the long-awaited restart.
The Newcastle Herald understands the re-opening has been locked in for Thursday, December 21 with only finishing touches to be completed before then.
The Herald was given early access to the new-look baths yesterday, where there were plenty of excited onlookers taking a peek from public areas around the site.
New features include an accessible ramp, stairs into the lap pool, extra seating along the lower promenade, new pool walls and coating, a new lifeguard hut and a shade structure on the upper promenade. Old favourites including the green bleacher seating, the round art deco stairs and the butchers block remain but have been upgraded.
"The really interesting thing about delivering infrastructure is people forget what it was like before you renewed it," Newcastle lord mayor Nuatali Nelmes said.
"So I think the reaction will be wonderful. It was always very well used and people will really appreciate the new facilities. I'm looking forward to a really positive engagement to start the process for stage 2 so we can finish the whole site."
It hasn't been the smoothest journey for the project after community criticism over the decision to concrete the pool floor causing fears the sandy floor would be lost, additional costs added and adverse weather delaying the project.
The lord mayor dismissed the some of the criticism as "political campaigns" and said the results of the overhaul spoke for themselves, including the retention of the sandy floor.
"The project has been relatively smooth considering how difficult this area is to do restorative construction in and also really taking to account the respect of the heritage of this site, which is 101 years old," she said.
"The baths shouldn't have had to wait 101 years. Probably this asset should have been restored 50 years ago.
"So I'm just so proud as a collective we've been able to achieve this.
"It looks amazing and I had obviously seen some photos but being here in person and seeing how great the pool deck looks, the bleachers, it's wonderful."
