Potential additions to pool design will add to cost

After adding some extras into the conceptual designs at citizen request, cost for the city’s swimming pool rose significantly.

Attendees at the last swimming pool committee meeting asked to ad a splash park to the pool plans. The designers supplied the city with plans for a splash park at the same location as the future pool, as well as plans for a park at a separate location. The pool plans were designed to fit one of the city’s proposed pool sites just south of Lodgepole Valley Youth Camp on Fort Sidney Rd., in order to formulate a proper cost estimate.

The price of the pool with a splash park attached is estimated at $4.5 million. Sidney residents asked that the splash pad be built at a separate location from the pool, but this would raise the cost to an estimated $5 million. These numbers are both higher than the amount the city projects it will take in from sales tax to pay for the pool, although no definite decisions on design or location have been made.

The city estimates that the portion of the half cent sales tax dedicated to the pool will bring in $3.5 to $4 million over 10 years.

In order to cut the higher price of the new pool design, Sidney Mayor Wendall Gaston suggested nixing some of the amenities.

“I’m not sure family locker rooms are worth $83,000,” he said.

Earlier estimates for the pool were between 3 and 4 million, before the addition of a splash pad.

Even though it would come at a higher cost, councilman Roger Gallaway suggested that the splash park be built at a different location than the pool.

“I guess I would still be inclined to keep it separate, and try to get that going as a separate project through separate funds and means, ” he said.

Lack of supervision is also an issue, if the splash park were constructed separately than the pool, Gaston said.

Gallaway argued that the separate splash pad would be beneficial because the pool’s hours are so limited.

“I think that can be a catalyst to draw people to another part of town,” said councilman Mark Nienhueser. “If you’re going to be at the pool, go to the pool. Why put the splash park there?”

The design for the new pool at the location on Fort Sidney Rd. would allow pump connections for an indoor pool in the future, if the city ever received the funds to construct one. This site would allow the community center to expand at its current site, or near the new swimming pool in the future.

Councilman Joe Arterburn suggested that building a new structure at the site of the city’s current pool could save costs because the infrastructure is already present.

Building at the current pool site would stop any community center expansion at its current site and also limits construction of an indoor pool in the same area, if the city chose to build one.

While the old pool location is restricted by the flood plain ditch and the nearby street, the Fort Sidney Rd. location offers much more space and the possibility of tennis courts and basketball courts nearby, said City Manager Gary Person.

“I think it’s a tight squeeze at the current location and not to lose an entire season of swimming also,” he said.

If the city constructed a new pool at the site of its old pool, it would have no swimming facilities for the community during the construction. If Sidney built at a new site, the old pool would continue to serve Sidney swimmers while the new one was built.

“It allows us flexibility so whatever we build now it allows us to add to it in the future,” Gallaway said. “But I also think the existing pool location would be an ideal site for a future law enforcement building.”

The city’s old pool, built in the 1970s, is located on Pole Creek Crossing, an arterial road with access to the highway and interstate.

If the city chose this pool location near the t-ball fields, it might have to do some additional road paving to ensure that dust wasn’t a problem, Nienhueser said.

“Somewhere in here we’ve got to address how our pedestrian traffic is going to come to and from the swimming pool,” he said.

The area around the t-ball fields is very busy during the summer and there are no sidewalks or plans for sidewalks along Fort Sidney Rd.

At the council’s request, the city will hold a pool committee meeting at noon on July 2 at city hall to get community input on the pool location.

The city hopes to construct the pool in 2015 to be available to the public by summer 2016.