September 2017 - Parks & Recreation - 106

Operations
The Challenge of Renovating
Historic Aquatic Facilities
How the Dallas Park & Recreation Department is preserving community history and memories
By Robin Steinshnider and David Mills

ow many times have you heard, " You can't tear that pool down, that's
where I learned to swim 50 years ago! " People grow attached to the institutions that mark major milestones in their lives. Communities develop
sentimental attachments to their local parks. And, even though these facilities may be obsolete, both physically and programmatically, it is difficult for the public
to imagine them changing from the way they live in memories.

Dallas Park & Recreation Department, David J. Mill

A Little History
One of the few things that make summer
in Texas bearable is swimming, so it's no
surprise that the city of Dallas has a long
pool history that started with the first
" neighborhood " pool, dating back to the
1920s and ending with the last " community " pool built in 1978. At the peak of the
pool boom, Dallas operated a system of
107 pools - 84 neighborhood pools and
23 community pools. Coinciding with the
boom in facilities, attendance began a dramatic decline in the late 1970s and continued throughout the 1980s, resulting in

the closure of many of the neighborhood
pools. Major changes in the Texas Health
Code forced the closure of the remaining
neighborhood pools in 1999.
In 2001, the city determined that an
aquatic master plan was needed to address the replacement of physically obsolete aquatic facilities and to improve the
overall level of service to the public in a financially sustainable way. While the master plan laid out a strategy for the future
of the Dallas aquatics system, no action
was taken because of a lack of available
funds. With the economic downturn in

The historic bathhouse and
pavilion buildings at the Tietze
Park pool, one of the oldest
operating pools in the Dallas
park system.

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2007 and 2008, the park department faced
shrinking operating and capital improvement budgets, which led to the closure or
limited operating hours of the remaining
community pools. Some of the aged pools
(oldest 1947; newest 1978) were patched
up to keep operating, while others were
literally cannibalized for parts. Uncertainty about which pools were open and the
limited operating hours led to further decreases in pool attendance.
After Dallas began to recover from the
economic downturn of 2008, pools once
again became a top priority for the park
department. Surrounding municipalities
began to build new aquatic centers, and
the disparity between the facilities in
Dallas and those in neighboring communities became even more evident. Dallas
was losing swimmers to the suburbs,
where they could enjoy modern amenities, including moving water, interactive
play elements, varying depths for different age groups, areas for swim lessons,
swim teams, shade structures, updated
bathhouses and concessions.
A new aquatics master plan was commissioned in 2012 to determine the feasibility
of developing a system of more economically sustainable family aquatic centers
throughout the city. With the strong support of the park and recreation board, $32
million was identified for construction of
new aquatic facilities, which was followed
by an update to the master plan intended to
map out how best to use the available funds.
Three years later, a team of planners, architects, engineers and aquatic consultants

September 2017 - Parks & Recreation

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