Royston Welcomes Plans For A Snowdome

Southampton Council looks at indoor snowsports centre

Southampton City Council wants the huge indoor snowsports centre to be built on the site of the city’s Town Depot.

Rising up alongside the northern approach to the Itchen Bridge, the real-snow ski slope would be the star attraction of a new leisure centre.

It has the potential to create hundreds of local jobs and attract hundreds of thousands of visitors to Southampton. It could also feature new shops, restaurants and bars, as well as other extreme sport activities such as a climbing wall.

The council wants the development to transform the 8.07 hectare industrial site and open the River Itchen waterfront to the public.

Councillor Royston Smith, the council’s deputy leader, said the indoor ski, snowboard and tobogganing dome would establish Southampton as the region’s premier leisure destination.

“It is early days, but we are very optimistic that there are two or three operators who would be interested in a large development like this,” said Cllr Smith.

“We want it to be a leisure complex that will be a regional draw and in order to do that we need something that is different and something that people will travel for.

“We want to put Southampton on the map regionally and we think a real-snow slope will do that. This is brilliant news for Southampton.”