Chelmsford’s asbestos-contaminated outdoor pool – once considered for use as a skate park, ball pool and city centre beach area – is set to be used a “simple but pleasant” car park for at least another three years.

Chelmsford City Council has said the £200,000 cost of building a new outdoor pool that was closed down in 2014 after asbestos was found in the pipe works was prohibitively expensive.

Instead it is proposing to extend the use of the land it designated in 2015 as a car park big enough for 70 spaces – potentially earning the council £120,000 year – for at least the next three years.

In October 2014 asbestos was discovered in the outdoor pool at Riverside Ice and Leisure and the pool, although not open to the public at the time, was cordoned off.

It is believed that the filling of the outdoor swimming pool has risen from £80,000 to more than £205,000.

The use of the outdoor pool was taken into consideration within the decision. A combination of unreliable weather, and general low interest in the use of the pool as noted by the staff in recent years, had meant it barely neared its capacity for 15 to 20 days a year.

With all this in mind, it was decided that to put the outdoor pool back in use would be extremely expensive for a facility that had a dwindling interest and therefore not economically viable, so alternative uses should be explored.

Various ideas as to what the pool should become were put forward. These included, among others, a skate park, a ball pool and a beach like area for sunbathing. Many ideas were dismissed for practical, financial and safety reasons.

The suggestion that did stand out, as well as addressing local need, being less financially onerous than the outdoor pool and relatively simple to convert, was a car park.

A council report said that since the John Lewis development started, parking has been at a premium.

It adds: “The proposed new Riverside scheme will exacerbate any shortage of car parking in the vicinity.

“The car park has been designed to be a pleasant place to be with good vision across the area. Plenty of openness and light. Cost has been a big influence on the design of the car park, as it will be a temporary provision until the current indoor pool is redeveloped.”