Prince George’s new pool will be an attractive, accessible facility that will help to welcome visitors to the downtown while enhancing the city’s aquatics offerings for residents of all ages and abilities, say city officials.
The entire facility is designed with a particular eye for safety and accessibly. Each of the pools have shallow entries and ‘pool pods’ to provide people with mobility devices to enter, while the main leisure pool has a gradual entry from zero depth. The facility also has much-improved lines of sight for lifeguards to increase safety for patrons. Meanwhile, the change rooms open onto the shallowest ends of the pools to decrease the likelihood of falls into deep water.
The main features of the pool include:
- A six-lane 25-metre lap pool
- A four-lane 25-metre teaching pool with warmer water and shallow depth
- A leisure pool with a lazy river, beach entry, and play features
- A large waterslide with a run-off lane
- A large whirlpool with two depths
- Dedicated male and female change rooms, as well as a large universal change room
- Three barrier-free shower rooms with ceiling lifts
- A sauna and steam room
- Two classrooms
- A comfortable viewing area
One of the more striking visual aspects of the new pool is its ’tilted box’ design, which allows for the increased height needed to house the waterslide at the southeast end of the building. The building then slopes towards the main entrance at Seventh Avenue and Quebec Street. The entry plaza will collect water run-off into a rain garden on Seventh Avenue.
The design process has included consultation with user groups. For further information about the new pool, please visit www.princegeorge.ca/newpool. Construction on the new pool is scheduled to begin later this year and the City expects the facility will open to the public by the summer of 2022. The Four Seasons will remain open until the new pool is ready for use.
In May 2019, the City announced that HDR Architecture, a global architecture, engineering, and consulting firm with expertise in sport and recreation design, and Chandos Construction, an award-winning, 100 per cent employee-owned Canadian construction company will be leading the design and construction of the city’s new aquatic facility.