About YMCA South Downs Leisure
YMCA South Downs Leisure operates a range of leisure centres, swimming pools and fitness facilities across West Sussex, providing inclusive, high-quality services that promote health, wellbeing and community engagement for people of all ages.
The organisation welcomes thousands of visitors each year, supporting everything from fitness and swimming to community events and organised activities. One of its flagship sites features a year-round heated outdoor swimming pool, indoor leisure facilities, fitness areas and extensive outdoor spaces, creating a dynamic environment where reliable communications and effective life safety systems are essential.
The Challenge
With a busy leisure centre operating across multiple indoor and outdoor locations, YMCA South Downs Leisure required more than a conventional radio system. The organisation needed an integrated communications platform capable of supporting day-to-day operations while providing immediate emergency notifications and faster incident response across the entire site.
The solution needed to provide:
- Reliable communications for management, lifeguards, operations and maintenance teams.
- Emergency lifeguard assistance call points.
- Disabled toilet alarm notifications.
- Direct integration with the site's fire alarm system.
- Enhanced protection for lone workers and maintenance staff.
- Precise identification of emergency locations to enable faster response times.
The Solution
To meet these requirements, Call Systems Technology (CST) designed and installed a fully integrated communications and life safety platform centred around 40 Hytera HP785 digital two-way radios. Combining digital radio communications, emergency alarm integration and staff safety technologies, the platform provides reliable communications and rapid emergency response across the entire leisure centre.
Selected for their rugged IP68-rated waterproof design, the Hytera HP785 radios are ideally suited to demanding leisure environments, delivering dependable communications across swimming pools, indoor facilities and extensive outdoor areas. Used by management, lifeguards, operations staff and maintenance teams, the radios provide clear, instant communication throughout the site.
To further enhance safety, the radios incorporate emergency panic alarms, Lone Worker monitoring and Man Down detection. If an emergency is triggered, designated radios immediately receive an alert identifying the person requiring assistance and their location, allowing colleagues to respond without delay.
Wireless emergency call points were installed throughout the leisure centre, including weatherproof lifeguard assistance points around the outdoor pool and emergency call points within indoor activity areas. When activated, each call point instantly transmits its precise location to designated staff radios, enabling colleagues to respond more quickly and accurately.
The accessible toilet alarm was also integrated into the communications platform. Rather than relying solely on a local audible alarm, emergency activations are transmitted via the CST AlarmCall™ Pro Plus directly to staff radios, ensuring assistance can be dispatched immediately.
The existing CTEC eight-zone fire alarm system was integrated with CST's AlarmCall™ Pro Plus interface. If the fire alarm is activated, the affected zone is automatically transmitted as a text message to designated Hytera radios, giving fire wardens immediate situational awareness and supporting a faster, more informed response.
Supporting a Busy Leisure Environment
The centre's heated outdoor swimming pool operates throughout the year and becomes particularly busy during the summer months, when concerts, live music and community events attract significantly higher visitor numbers.
Maintaining reliable communications across these large outdoor spaces is essential. CST's digital radio network provides dependable site-wide coverage, enabling lifeguards, event staff, security personnel and maintenance teams to communicate quickly and effectively, regardless of where they are working.
The integrated solution has delivered significant operational and safety benefits across the leisure centre, including:
- Improved communication between lifeguards, operations teams and maintenance staff across the entire site.
- Faster emergency response through instant radio alerts.
- Immediate notification of lifeguard assistance requests.
- Fire alarm zone information transmitted directly to fire wardens' radios.
- Rapid response to disabled toilet emergency activations.
- Greater staff safety through Lone Worker monitoring, Man Down detection and emergency alerting.
- Improved operational efficiency through a single integrated communications platform.
Conclusion
By integrating Hytera digital two-way radios with wireless emergency call points, accessible toilet alarms and fire alarm messaging, CST has delivered a single communications and life safety platform tailored to the operational needs of YMCA South Downs Leisure.
The solution improves day-to-day communications, accelerates emergency response, enhances staff safety and provides the organisation with a scalable platform capable of supporting its busy leisure facilities now and into the future.