Manito splash pad postponed

Spokane parks officials are giving up on a proposal to complete a splash pad water play feature at Manito Park this year, but hope to get the project built in 2009.

A problem with subsurface rock has slowed a consultant effort to find a good location is at Manito for the play feature being financed through a $42.9 million bond issue approved by voters last year.

Much of the land at Manito has bedrock so close to the surface that excavation for pipes and utilities will be difficult, said Nancy Goodspeed, parks spokeswoman. “You hit rock without even going 6 inches down,” she said this week. “It’s going to be harder to do than we thought.”

Work on five other splash pads is expected this year, and they are slated for Thornton Murphy, Coeur d’Alene, Chief Garry, Friendship and Audubon parks. Parks officials and their consultants are shooting for opening them at mid-summer. They are being built as replacements for the city’s former wading pools.

The bond issue plan calls for five splash pads at other parks to be completed in 2009, including Manito.

In other developments, parks officials this week were going to return to the Comstock Neighborhood with a plan to keep the existing Comstock bathhouse and replace it with a 25-yard wide pool that would allow lap swimming, but would also have a beachlike entry on the east end closest to the bath house, said Carl Strong, aquatics supervisor for the city.

Residents in the Comstock area have argued in favor of keeping the historic-looking bathhouse and the existing pool configuration.

In a recent e-mail, resident Elisabeth Buxton said, “Like many other swimmers, I agree that we don’t need any fancy water features – we would like the pool to be repaired and restored so that we can have lap swimming and family swim times like we have had in the past.”

The so-called “zero-depth entry” on the east end is a popular feature in modern pools and is intended to serve small children and parents in the same way that wading pools had in the past.

Through consultants, the city has learned that it can save money on pool construction by rehabilitating bathhouses at Comstock and possibly Witter, Cannon and Liberty pools rather than completely replacing them.

“That money can go into pool features,” Goodspeed said.

A series of neighborhood meetings was being held this week with the last two scheduled for tonight on Cannon Pool at the West Central Community Center, 1603 N. Belt St., and Liberty Pool at the East Central Community Center, 500 S. Stone. Both meetings are from 6:30 to 8 p.m.

Other meetings were held Tuesday and Wednesday for a new pool in Northwest Spokane to replace the former pools at Shadle Park and Witter, Hillyard and Comstock pools.

Normally, Witter Pool is kept open in September for lap swimming and other activities, but Witter is being closed at the end of August to allow for construction of a new pool there to begin as soon as possible.

The city wants to have each of its pools completed for the 2009 season.

At Hillyard, residents have backed a proposal to move Hillyard Pool to the south side of Harmon Park a few blocks to the north of the existing pool, which borders the heavily traveled Haven Street adjacent to Market Street.

In Northwest Spokane, residents are debating the best location for a new pool there, including the west side of Shadle Park, the Albi Stadium grounds or Loma Vista Park.

Residents from the Loma Vista area are opposing locating a pool there because it would change the quiet character of the park.