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The lengthy closure of central Auckland's only public pool annoys many of the growing number of people living nearby, including Ms Krivoshapko.

The Ponsonby resident enjoys taking her 7-year-old daughter and 9-year-old son to the baths for swimming lessons every Monday and Thursday and appreciates how close it is to  home.

She isn't looking forward to having to go  further afield.

Unfortunately for her, Herne Bay's Point Erin Pool and the Parnell Baths open only in summer. "I don't know what we'll do," she says.

"Maybe we'll have to go to Newmarket. I don't like Newmarket."

Last year, engineers found that the 95-year-old Tepid Baths had serious structural damage, including  weakened steel roof trusses and crumbling concrete around the pool.

The council expects repairs to cost ratepayers about $15 million and plans to close the baths from April 18 - a month earlier than originally intended.

Leighton Carrad, who has been using the pool for more than 60 years, is suspicious of the council's plans for the prime real estate.

"I don't think they're going to reopen the pools and neither does anyone else I've spoken to," he says.

In the 1970s,  Mr Carrad was one of a  group which successfully opposed the council's attempt to sell the land to private developers.

Today, the Remuera resident fears development is back on the agenda.

He is not the only one. Richard Northey, the opposition leader on the council, says part of the reason for the four-year timeframe is to give the public a chance to consider whether central Auckland even needs a public pool.

"Some of the Citizens and Ratepayers [council's main power bloc] and senior staff don't think the expenditure is justified," he says.

However, he believes the baths will remain.

Mr Northey expects the council to discuss the matter in about a month during discussions about its annual and long-term plans.

However, Greg Moyle, chairman  of the council's arts, culture and recreation committee, disputes Mr Northey's comments and Mr Carrad's fears.

"There has never been a suggestion that we'd do without an inner-city pool," he says.

"The question is whether it's a patch-up job, a rebuild, or somewhere in between."

But there was a suggestion.

In May 2008, Mr Moyle was quoted as saying the council was considering closing the baths as a public swimming pool and using  the site for another purpose.

Should the council take that route, alternative developments would be limited by the baths' heritage status which gives it protection from demolition.

Mr Moyle, a member of Citizens and Ratepayers, who has declared his intention to run for the amalgamated city's central Auckland ward - says the baths will reopen much earlier than 2014,  probably within a couple of years.

He told The Aucklander that he didn't know where the four-year timeframe  had come from. However, when the planned closure was first publicised in November last year,  Mr Moyle said the baths would reopen in 2014, in time for its 100th birthday.

Now he's saying that if the council decides to do a "patch-up job", the baths would be closed only for a matter of months.

Alternatively, a rebuild would take a couple of years, he says.

The council is expected to decide between the short and long-term solutions by the end of  this month.

It has been aware since at least 2008 that the pools need a major upgrade but overestimated how long it could safely remain open.

The council planned a two-year, $12 million overhaul to start after the Rugby World Cup,  expecting the pools to remain open until then.

However, the earlier-than-expected forced closure threw that plan out.

The Aucklander understands the council intended to wait for the $12 million earmarked for 2012 to come available before starting construction, and that accounted for the projected four-year closure figure.

Mr Moyle says the council is now prepared to borrow the money so the baths can reopen earlier than 2014.