Pool resources

Architectural Review, The, August, 1994 by Ed Mofatt

Molassana is a large working-class suburb of Genoa, not run down, but scarcely overendowed with facilities. The Sciorba sports centre is an attempt to give the area heart and lies at the bottom of the valley that forms the main axis of the 200 000 strong community.

The city's aim was to create an all-weather complex that could cater for a very wide range of interests. There is a soccer pitch surrounded by a running track, two outdoor swimming pools and a 50m indoor pool which concerns us here.

This pool is of interest chiefly because it can move into many different configurations. The pool's depth can be varied from nothing to 2.05m by altering the height of the base slabs on pneumatic jacks, and different depths can be provided simultaneously by dividing it into 33.3m and 15m portions by a movable partition. (When pool depth is changed, the slabs move through the water without displacing the volume.)

All along the west side of the pool is a tribune of seating that can be retracted mechanically to make a gymnasium which can be sealed thermally and acoustically from the pool by sliding glass partitions.

These devices are remarkable enough, but the most dramatic feature of the building is its retractable roof. The covering of the pool hall is divided into five parts, one fixed and the other four movable. The latter can be mechanically telescoped southwards under the fixed portion of the roof, exposing virtually the whole pool to open air and to the sun terrace.

Each part of the roof is composed of four steel box portal frames braced by steel beams and covered in aluminium deck and glazing. These sliding portals are connected to each other by gaskets and bear through stainless steel wheels and tracks on to the ground on their tall east sides. The other bearing is on to the great structural duct which makes the ridge of the building, running in a clear span 56.6m from in-situ supports at north and south ends. This hollow oval beam, which tapers from a depth of 7m at its southerly end over the plant rooms to 4.4m at the other, is the principal structural member; the roof over the retractable seating is propped on to it by a simple precast secondary system. The duct distributes warm air throughout the building, it acts internally as a lighting gantry, and externally its red streak gives the complex a landmark quality.