Outside the locked doors and darkened Y Chifley Health and Wellness Centre remains a sign, perhaps destined for the tip.
"Join the gym that feels like family," it says.
According to 80-year-old Albert Oberdorf, it was no exaggeration.
The Woden resident attended the YMCA gym for 15 years, one of about 200 members and 50 exercise physiology clients.
'Cold blooded'
On his 80th birthday he opened "a cold-blooded email" and learned the gym will close on April 5. Some classes stopped immediately.
"The word devastated would be an understatement," Mr Oberdorf said.
The YMCA-run facility had specialised equipment and support staff for seniors and people with disabilities.
The YMCA is also closing a weekly exercise class in Karabar, Queanbeyan.
Deakin resident Chris Welburn, 76, had a stroke in 2008 and is paralysed on the left side of body.
"It has a lot of ancillary equipment, which you don't find in normal gyms," he said about the Chifley fitness centre.
Staff help Mr Welburn move from his car to the gym via his scooter, and strap into equipment. They also had an exercise physiologist.
"If I can't get to the gym, I'll just deteriorate even further. It's bad enough coping with what I've got," he said.
'Totally ignored and forgotten'
Mr Welburn said other gyms did not have the accessible facilities of the Y, such as easy parking, a ramp, disabled toilets and an accepting environment.
"We're going round in wheelchairs, we've got amputees ... and we're just accepted, and everybody knows everybody else. It's like a little community," he said.
"We have just been totally ignored and forgotten about."
In a letter to Chief Minister Andrew Barr and Health Minister Rachel Stephen-Smith, client and ophthalmologist Thomas Walker said:
"They come with their oxygen concentrators, their artificial limbs, their paralysed limbs, with walking frames and in wheelchairs.
"Please invest in preventative medicine and keep this valuable health facility open. Personally, it is great for me to be without medication at [age 88]."
YMCA shift
The global YMCA body has decided to focus on young people.
In a March 12 letter to customers, chief executive officer Kirsty Dixon said they were closing the gym "with a heavy heart".
In a statement, Y Canberra Region said "the cost of doing business is increasingly tough for not-for-profits."
"Over the past few years, the Y Canberra Region team has donated over $1 million dollars of its own financial reserves to keep these small services operating for a couple of hundred members," they said.
"The small Chifley Gym and Karabar program, operates like a social enterprise, is not a public service, nor is it funded by taxpayers or the government.
"The Y Canberra Region, have kept the doors open as long as we can, and sadly, we have now had to close our doors for this small group of members."
The YMCA will be holding town hall meetings every Wednesday until the gym's closure.
There will be a farewell gathering on April 5.
All class and membership fees will be refunded.
No time to say goodbye
Pam Harris has used the gym for 17 years.
She has lung disease and uses a scooter.
Attending the centre three times a week was about more than just fitness.
"It's our mental health as well, because we're mixing with people who need company," she said.
Mr Oberdorf said he watched young staff grow up, graduate, get married, have families.
"The staff are distraught as well. But there wasn't very much time to talk with them," Mr Oberdorf said, getting emotional.
"Things are bad enough as it is, but not being able to say goodbye [is dreadful]."
