the future of the weights room

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April 2021 

Dear Members

A Big Thank You

We would like to start with a big thank you for all the support and patience our members have shown during the last year.  

We have tackled the challenges and hope to reopen more and more over the coming weeks as restrictions lift.  

22 Queen Street

As you may be aware, it was necessary for us to vacate 22 Queen Street (the main building housing the snooker hall and bar) over lock-down, an inevitability that was simply accelerated by the circumstances.  

A consequence of vacating the building has been the loss of valuable dance and function space, as well as the bar, snooker and office facilities at Queen Street.  

Our Charitable Objectives  

As a charity we make our strategic decisions in line with promoting our charitable objectives, these are summarised below.  

1) The promotion of community participation in healthy recreation through the provision of facilities for playing particular sports within the area of York

2) The promotion and advancement of education by the encouragement of the arts through the provision of facilities for the general public to participate in the arts of drama, mime, dance, music, painting and sculpture, photography, cinema, literature and poetry and to improve the general standard of dramatic productions in York and elsewhere; and

3) To provide or assist in the provision of facilities in the interests of social welfare for recreation or other leisure time occupation of individuals who have need of such facilities by reason of their youth, age, infirmity or disablement, financial hardship or social and economic circumstances or for the public at large in the interests of social welfare and with the object of improving the condition of life of the said inhabitants

Our Reopening and the Weights Room

Ahead of reopening and throughout the restrictions being eased, the Queen Street Management Team have the large task of assessing the risks, making sure we keep everyone safe, and ensuring we fulfil our objectives in the most effective way.

As part of our work assessing the risks of reopening, we have identified certain areas as requiring further attention. One such area, is the weights room.  

To summarise the issues that have been identified:
 

• Ventilation: the weights room is an enclosed space with no windows to ventilate the space
   
• Space: there is limited space in the weights room, and currently the number of machines in the room makes social distancing difficult  
   
• Cleaning: machines and equipment will need to be cleaned after every use
   
• Management: for the safety of our members using the space, the room will need to be managed for both physical safety, ensuring the machines and equipment are being used correctly, and to also ensure hygiene protocols are being followed
   

Our limitations:

• We are unable to make physical changes to the space to increase ventilation or square footage
   
• The RI with being operated through volunteers for the foreseeable and will have limited capacity to dedicate to manning the space to ensure safety and hygiene  
   

Solutions we have explored:

1. Removing some of the machines / equipment to increase space and increase scope for social distancing  
    
2. Bringing the machines / equipment into the main hall to spread out on some of the badminton courts
    
3. A third party relationship to license the management of the space as a weights room  
    

While exploring the options above, the committee has observed the below:  

Option 1  

This would require reduced use of the space, meaning a minimal number of users could make use of the facility. As part of our reopening plan, the venue will reduce its opening hours to operate in the evenings only. This reduced use, and reduced hours will have a large impact on the viability of the space. In addition, an attendant would still be required in the space to ensure safety and hygiene requirements are being met.

Option 2  

This would potentially resolve the space and ventilation issues and allow for an attendant in the main hall to also monitor the use of the weights. However, the floor of the main hall is wood-sprung and would unfortunately not support the weight of the machines.  

Option 3  

This has been explored, however a relationship has not yet been found. We are conscious at this time, that for another party to take on the management of the room, they would face the same challenges and obligations that we do, which may be an influencing factor in a third party taking on the license.   

The Management Team is therefore faced with an unfavourable decision. We are obliged to make our decisions with the promotion of the charitable objectives and a proposal has been made to the committee for us to consider the following:

• Repurpose the weights room as a multi use space and remove the equipment
   

As part of considering the proposal, the committee are considering the following pros and cons of the suggestions:

• The weights room has been a cornerstone of the York RI and the decision to repurpose the space and remove weights from our activities should not be taken lightly  
   
• A multi purpose space may help to further the charitable objectives relating to dance and the arts and create options for office or function space
   
• York has a limited amount of dance space, this has been fed back by the previous users of the main building who has struggled to find similar spaces
   
• Our weights users would likely be able to find alternative and affordable gyms in the city
   
• If the weights room remains, the increased obligations would lead to an inevitable price rise for weights members

Your Opinions

As part of evaluating the best way forward, we are reaching out to our users of the weights room to gather suggestions and feedback.  

We value the input of our members and endeavour to gather this information before a decision is made.

Please submit your answers to the questions below. 

Kind regards

QSMT