ITS halls and corridors echo with decades of memories and for one coach who trained thousands of young gymnasts Meadowbank Stadium in the Scottish capital is irreplaceable.
The closure of its doors for the final time on Sunday has prompted a nostalgic return from the sporting community.
For Maggie Bisset, the stadium has been the home of the club she founded, Meadowbank Gymnastics Club, since 1971.
Ms Bisset, 67, who remains a coach, said: "I still remember the first day and nobody turned up for the classes.
"One of the management team went out into the corridor and found a couple of kids with parents and so I had two children that first week.
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"It built up quite quickly and I ended up forming the Meadowbank Gymnastic Club to cater for kids that needed a bit more training and who showed a bit of potential.
"We are very fond of this hall, so we are very sad.
"Friday this week is our last session in here and we’ve bought most of the equipment so we will have to take it down to find a way to transport everything."
The new £41m facility due in 2020 may come too late as the club looks for its own gymnasium while using a facility in Portobello in the meantime
Ms Bisset continued: "It doesn’t matter where we end up, we'll keep the name.
"This has got history, hasn’t it, and the memories.
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"There’s just something about Meadowbank that I don’t think anywhere else can replicate."
Bert Cunningham, who coached trampolining for more than 40 years at Meadowbank, also said many were often finding their feet in the early days of the stadium.
The 88-year-old said: "For the first week I just brought my son down, and then after that we had a waiting list by the end of the year and I’ve been coaching since."
His final day in the stadium, however, was playing walking football there this week.
Former athlete Peter Hoffmann has written a book that features the stadium, A Life in A Day In A Year, also recently started up a Facebook page, Memory Hold The Door - Meadowbank Sports Centre, with stories and photographs from days gone by.
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Mr Hoffmann, 60, started as a sprinter, was an Olympian in Montreal in 1976 and claimed gold, silver and bronze at British and Scottish Championships.
He said: "I first came down in 1971. I did watch the Games in ’70, but I was too shy to come down, I thought you had to be a fantastic athlete to train here. So I waited a whole until I came down with one of my cousins so I had somebody to come with and 'hold my hand'.
"Ironically he stopped coming but I just kept coming back.
"It was a big part of my life."
Allan Wells and Yvonne Murray trained at the stadium which also hosted Liz McColgan winning Commonwealth gold while Olympian Sir Chris Hoy backed the campaign to keep a velodrome at the new centre, with an ambition to set up a track in Craigmillar the best option so far.
The brutalist icon was built for the 1970 Commonwealth Games and has been used by thousands of sportspeople and welcomed huge sports crowds as well as music fans with the venue housing music events from the Chemical Brothers to Elton John.
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Ian Campbell, Edinburgh culture vice convener, said: “It is the end of an era for Meadowbank and the start of a major redevelopment to support physical activity, health and wellbeing in Edinburgh.
"The old Meadowbank has been at the heart of sport in Edinburgh for almost half a century.
"It has been used by millions over the decades and I am sure that many people from all around the world who have passed through its doors will treasure memories of great sporting moments created within its walls."
June Peebles, chief executive of Edinburgh Leisure, said: “The new venue will undoubtedly pick up where the old Meadowbank left off; it will provide countless opportunities for generations to come to participate in physical activity and sport.
"New sporting memories will be created."
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