A COMMITTEE has been formed to help push a movement to bring back swimming in lakes in Promenade Park.

The Marine Lake in the park in Maldon has been shut to members of the public for just under 15 years.

In August 2002, 45-year-old Kevin Gay died after he hit his head on a submerged post when diving into the lake.

Following this the council shut the lake and drained two million gallons of water from it.

In May, an online petition was launched to bring back public swimming in the lakes by a group of Maldon residents including Marie Ellis and Lisa Cullumbine, who believe there is huge demand for the pool to re-open.

The initial petition gained hundreds of signatures, and after putting out many paper petitions across the district, earlier this month the movement gained more than 1,000 supporters.

On Saturday, a meeting was held at The Queen’s Head on Hythe Quay where a ten-strong committee met to discuss plans moving forward.

Following this, Janet Hall of the Steam Tug Brent Trust paid for 1000 flyers to be printed for the committe to use.

On Sunday, at the Maldon Motor Show in Promenade Park, four of the committee dropped 700 flyers on cars and other venues around the prom in between collecting more signatures.

As of Monday, the movement now has 1,525 supporters from across the district.

Lisa Cullumbine said: “Our meeting we had on Saturday was very informative, we keep getting a great deal of support.

“The current figure of just over 1,500 signatures is continuing to rise week by week, and our supporters are still very enthusiastic and keen to push it further.

“The motor show on Sunday was a huge success for us, we handed out 700 flyers and in between this and enjoying the show we collected even more signatures for the petition.

“This certainly is not going away any time soon, people really want these lakes to be used again.”

The original online petition has 706 signatures. See http://bit.ly/2qnY48R.