City landmark prepares for another new chapter

OVERLOOKING the promenade and long sweeping sands of the beach, with priceless views from its many seafront-facing offices, the civic centre is one of the most recognisable buildings in Swansea city centre.

- ROBERT DALLING Reporter

How Y storfa, Swansea's new public service hub in the city centre will look.

Home to Swansea Council and the city’s central library, it has been regularly used by people across the city every day for generations.

It first opened in July 1982, as County Hall, as the headquarters of the former West Glamorgan County Council. Then, following local government re-organisation in 1996, its ownership was transferred to the new City and County of Swansea.

The building was renamed the Civic Centre on March 19, 2008, and Swansea Central Library was moved in as part of a redevelopment scheme, where it has remained ever since.

That's until now, at least.

Forty three years later, the council, and the library, is on the move once again, with a brand new future on the horizon for the civic centre.

But it is not the first time the area will have experienced such dramatic change.

Long before the civic centre was built, there was a thriving community of people living alongside where it now sits.