Mayoral Musings: It's time to fully invest in bringing Borough pools back up to expectations of community

For the first time in over 20 years, comprehensive upgrades and improvements are being considered for both White’s Road Pool and Fourth Street Pool. On Wednesday night, council and I reviewed plans to redesign both pools by adding modern pool amenities, removing aged assets that are beyond their useful life, reconfiguring and redeveloping the bath houses to meet modern standard, and repairing the core infrastructure to ensure its continued life going forward.

Improvements on this scale would require investments of around $6 million.

To be clear, and not to understate the needs for these repairs and upgrades, White’s Road Pool is in dire need of repair and redevelopment. Without upgrades and just necessary repairs, White’s Road Pool needs more than $1.5 million in basic repair and investment to keep it operational beyond 2024. After 20-plus years of use and minimal investment we are, frankly, at the end of the pool’s lifespan and it is time to fully invest in it to bring White’s Road Pool back up to the expectations and needs of our community.

Since we are at the investment point of White’s Road Pool, it makes sense to prioritize the comprehensive redevelopment of the pool and not do the bare minimum. This means investing around $3.5 million in upgrades inclusive of:

· A redeveloped wading pool that has new and improved features for kids and families

· Additional shade features across the pool to protect people from the sun

· Repurposing the intermediate pool into a leisure and fitness pool that allows for semi-submerged chairs

· Café seating and coverage

· The addition of a closed flume water slide to the main pool

· A complete overhaul and redesign of the bath house inclusive of added ADA rooms and more bathroom facilities for all changing spaces.

Fourth Street Pool is a similar, but slightly different, story.

Like White’s Road Pool, Fourth Street has not been upgraded or enhanced since the 1990s and needs modernization and improvement. However, basic repairs to keep Fourth Street functioning and operational beyond 2024 will cost around $150,000 while a complete upgrade will be around $2 million.

This is not to say we should not upgrade Fourth Street soon. We do need to upgrade Fourth Street Pool and provide the same types of modern amenities we are hopefully bringing to White’s Road. However, since it would be operationally challenging to redesign both pools at the same time, we should look at investing in Fourth Street in 2026, rather than in 2025.

Like the White’s Road improvements, Fourth Street Pool would be receiving all the following if the current plan is executed:

· Added shade/cantilevers to help diminish time in the sun

· A new open flume water slide

· Added café tables and coverage for eating

· A redeveloped wading pool that has more amenities for children and families

While this is a preliminary review of the possible improvements to the pool and there is much to discuss before final approval, the funding of these improvements will be a key discussion point for all involved.

Currently, the best option is to include these projects in our bond borrowing that was slated to take place this year and was delayed by  the departure of our finance director. This will allow us to spread the cost of these investments over 30 years rather than trying to fund the improvements on the back of a large tax or pool membership increase.

A long-term improvement plan and redevelopment fund needs to be established to ensure that the pools are always being upgraded and modernized throughout their life rather than occurring every 20 to 30 years. It is better financially, and frankly logically, to continuously improve our pool infrastructure incrementally rather than taking out debt on a long-term cadence. We have deployed a similar structure with our roadways and have been able to repair more roads more efficiently by doing so.

There will be more to discuss on this topic as the upgrade and improvements move toward final approval and financing, but I am happy to see us investing in our pools and improving our community assets to, ultimately, make Lansdale a better place to live, work, and play for all of us.

(Mayoral Musings is a weekly op-ed column submitted to North Penn Now, courtesy of Lansdale Borough Mayor Garry Herbert. The views expressed are his own and are not representative of North Penn Now or Lansdale Borough.)