The Arnold Recreation Center’s indoor pool will be closed for more than two months starting July 10.
Parks and Recreation Department Director David Crutchley said he expects the pool to reopen Sept. 18.
The indoor pool area will be closed to allow workers to remove rust from and repaint beams and ductwork over the pool, install a new staircase for the slide and lay new flooring in the men’s and woman’s locker rooms.
The outdoor pool at the rec center, 1695 Missouri State Road, typically closes for the season each year after Labor Day, which is Sept. 4.
However, it will remain open longer this season to provide a swimming area during the work, Crutchley said.
“We wanted to make sure this was done while we had two pools so there is a body of water for people to exercise, have leisure play, aerobics and classes,” he said.
Crutchley said the city anticipates opening the outdoor pool at 6 a.m., weather permitting, every day during the indoor pool closure.
He said the outdoor pool will be used to hold classes and allow rec center members to swim laps from 6 a.m. to 11 a.m.
The outdoor pool will then be open for recreational use at 11 a.m. for members and 11:30 a.m. for non-members, and it will close daily at 7 p.m.
Crutchley said no classes will be held during the open swim period.
He said he is sorry for the inconvenience the closure will cause, but the repairs are needed.
“We have to do this in order to maintain the indoor pool,” he said. “I hope everyone understands we are trying to take care of our building so they can enjoy it for many more years, while also providing an alternative pool. Hopefully, it works out for everybody.”
Indoor pool work
City Council members voted 6-0 June 15 to pay $262,580 to The Paintsmiths of St. Louis to remove rust from and paint beams, ductwork and piping in the indoor pool area. Ward 1 Councilman Jason Fulbright and Ward 4 Councilman Butch Cooley were absent from the meeting.
The company also will replace the flooring in the men’s and women’s locker rooms with a quartz floor.
In order to perform the indoor pool work, scaffolding will be erected throughout the pool area. Crutchley said it will take about a week for the scaffolding to be put up, about five weeks for the company to remove rust and paint and another week to remove the scaffolding.
“The scaffolding will allow them access to every inch of the ceiling,” he said. “We had some people say they could get lifts in there, but it is impossible to get a lift in there to get every inch. Plus, it would take months for one person to try to do that. The scaffolding is the best way to go.”
Workers will remove rust and salt from beams, ductwork, piping and the underside of the bridge located at the southeast end of the pool. They also will apply two coats of epoxy to those components.
“The beams are showing a lot of rust on the bottom,” Crutchley said. “The
ductwork is probably the worst of it all. The HVAC ductwork is pretty much covered in surface rust. They will grind that down and then repaint it with two-part primer and two-part epoxy paint over that.”
While the work in the indoor pool area is underway, the company will put the quartz floor over the existing flooring in the locker rooms. The new floor will then be coated with a protective epoxy, according to council documents.
The flooring work is expected to be completed in two and a half weeks, documents said.
Crutchley said the new floors are replacing two different kinds of flooring currently in the locker rooms – tile in the restroom and shower areas and epoxy flooring in the locker areas.
“We have recoated the epoxy part of the locker rooms ourselves at least twice,” he said. “It has never been professionally done. It will be very nice to have that done.”
Crutchley said the new locker room floors will be easier to clean.
“The biggest thing is that the shower floor is tile now, and those tiles need to be regrouted,” he said. “By changing it there will be no grout on the shower floors, so it will be one smooth surface that is easier to clean. The most exciting part is that it will be more sanitary. We will be able to clean the floor without dealing with grout lines that you have to get into to scrub.”
After The Paintsmiths completes its work, Crutchley said SplashTacular Waterslides and Waterparks Attractions of Paola, Kan., will replace the staircase and steps for the indoor pool water slide. He said that work is expected to take place from Sept. 11 to Sept. 17.
In March, council members voted 7-1 to pay $293,205 to replace the staircase and steps.
Crutchley previously said the staircase is structurally sound, but rust has formed throughout the staircase. He said rust has splintered and fallen off the staircase and steps, which may lead to people getting steel splinters in their hands and feet.
“The steel is thick, but you can’t have rust continually eating away and falling from it,” he said. “It is not in danger of collapsing. If that were the case, it would have been gone a long time ago.”
The city has another project planned to improve the indoor pool following the closure. In November, two new Pool Paks, which are large dehumidifiers above the indoor pool area, will be installed.
In April, the council voted unanimously to pay $743,454 to Peters-Eichler Mechanical of St. Louis to replace the Pool Paks. Crutchley said city officials believe the indoor pool will not be closed for a significant amount of time when the Pool Paks are installed.
“The indoor pool may need to be closed for a portion of a day or an entire day when the Pool Paks are lifted onto the roof,” he said. “We may close it down while they are being lifted over the building. We usually do that whenever they are lifting something over the building.”
The improvements to the indoor pool area are among the last projects the city has planned to fix problems in the rec center, which opened in August 2005.
The city has already replaced the roof and installed new flooring in the building’s three meeting rooms. There are still plans to replace pulse boilers and other equipment throughout the rec center.
“It is much needed work, and it will be good when it is all done,” City Administrator Bryan Richison said. “A lot of the equipment is original, and you can’t expect it to last forever. Because of the financial situation, we have put it off, and we have reached the point where you can’t do that anymore.
“I think when we get done with all of this work, the building will be in really good condition. Everything will be in working order and hopefully not breaking down, which is what we are dealing with currently.”