Long before the last swimmer splashed out of the Kinsmen Pool in Soper Park on Sept. 6, the City of Cambridge began brainstorming on what to do with the site once the 60-year-old facility is decommissioned this fall.
Earlier this week, the city launched a page on the EngageWR website asking residents to provide ideas on the next phase of the park’s transformation.
Residents can also take part a survey designed to get a better idea of the types of park features citizens value most.
Shift Landscape Architecture has offered three concepts it hopes can be used as a “jumping off point” for residents to provide input in the months ahead.
The “pollinators and play” concept features raised planters and a pollinator garden surrounding a playground and dino dig, shaded structure and splashpad.
The “sports and splash” concept features a variety of recreational play areas, including a multi-use court that could be used for sports like tennis and basketball, a beach volleyball court, seating platforms, shade areas, a splash pad, and other features like a ping pong table and bocce ball court. String lights hang over a main shade feature at the entrance to the park.
The final concept is “art and agriculture” and features a playground, interactive art feature and sculptural play feature in one zone, and a community garden, planters and walkways in another zone, all surrounded by a grove of trees.
The city notes these are just potential ideas exploring the types of amenities that are possible.
“This is to help us with our final design,” deputy city manager Hardy Bromberg said.
Every few decades parks go through a bit of a transformation, he added.
In Soper Park, the pool is one example of that, sitting on the site of what used to be a famed peony garden planted back in 1922.
“We have documents where we have visitors from across Canada and as far as the US coming to view those gardens,” he said.
The loss of the Soper Park pool will have a negligible impact on aquatics programs in the city, Bromberg said, adding the shift to indoor facilities, where weather and seasonality are not factors, has been happening for decades.
With the Soper Park pool exceeding its expected life span, refurbishment costs too prohibitive, and pool use waning over the last five years, it was inevitable the city would look for new ways to utilize the space.
Bromberg said programs at the pool went from 80 per cent capacity to just over 20 per cent of capacity in 2019. The cost to keep the pool open indefinitely would have been $537,000.
“What are we now going to put there for the next 60 years? That’s what staff are really excited about now,” he said.
Last practice of the season at Soper Pool. People have been swimming at Soper Park for over 100 years. pic.twitter.com/L8jou0BCcd
— Aquajetnation (@aquajetnation) August 20, 2021
With the 71-year-old George Hancock Pool slated to close at the end of the 2024 season, the Ed Newland Pool will be the only remaining outdoor pool in Cambridge.
The city’s oldest pool, built in 1930 and popularly known as “Eddie’s” was refurbished in 1999.
Bromberg said the plan is to keep the Preston pool in good repair so it can continue to serve the community well into the future, but had no timeline on its life expectancy.
Keeping Hancock open for the next two years is costing the city an estimated $347,000, equal to about $16 per swimmer over the course of the summer.
Once it closes, Cambridge will be in line with cities like Waterloo and Guelph, which have one outdoor pool.
Swimmers will have more year-round options once the city moves ahead with a plan to build a 10-lane, 25 metre pool at a new recreation complex in the south end in 2025.
Bromberg said the facility will be accessible on a public transit route and multi-use trails.
“I think that will serve our community quite well,” he said.
Although sports tourism was touted as a way to generate revenue in a 2015 facility needs assessment report, Bromberg said it's not a priority for the new facility.
He said there was discussion at the regional level to build a 50-metre pool that could host competitive swim events and drive a bit of revenue to the municipality, but the cost of building, operating and maintaining an Olympic sized pool is beyond the means of a city the size of Cambridge.
Background work for the recreation complex is ongoing and should reach the stage of public engagement and final design early next year, he said.
The John Dolson Centre Pool will be decommissioned once the new recreation centre opens but the WG Johnson Centre Pool is staying open.
