Thorn lights up DG One Leisure Complex

The £12.75m DG One Leisure Complex, Dumfries opened in May 2008 offering unrivalled leisure facilities including a multi-purpose sports hall, 25m 8-lane competition pool, health and fitness centre as well as a café.

Built by Kier Northern, with electrical contracting by Haden Young of Glasgow, Thorn was commissioned early on to help design lighting for the complex.

In the pool area, installing bright illumination for clear visibility was paramount in aiding the lifeguards, as well as balancing this with a sympathetic design to enhance a comfortable environment for swimmers, both in and out of the water. In the sports hall, the lighting needed to meet the needs of many types of court activities, plus cater for concerts and conferences.

To overcome the variable ceiling height in the main pool area two rows of 14 ‘Troika' flat glass floodlights were fixed, in pairs, to structural steel purlins across the pool using special brackets, with a further two on each of the end walls. These 400W metal halide lamped uplights provided an average 350 lux with good colour rendition and softer lighting, and being aluminium, sealed to IP65, could withstand humidity and corrosion. Twelve floodlights light the flume area.

The Sports Hall has been lit with 36 fluorescent T5 Titus Sports luminaires, with ‘switching' levels up to 500 lux.

The complex is Scotland's biggest local authority sport-related project and expects over 400,000 customer visits in its first year.