By Myrna Trauntvein
Times-News Correpondent
The splash pad wading pool liner should be in place in the next week or so.
CEM Aquatics, Salt Lake City, will install the Myrtha liner for the standing water portion of the wading pool.
"Earlier this year," said Randy McKnight, city administrator, "the council approved a change in the city's purchasing ordinance to allow for purchases from a single source of supply when conditions warrant."
Since CEM Aquatics is the single-source supplier for the liner to be installed in the standing-water portion of the splash pad, the council ratified the purchase order.
"We are pretty much on schedule to open in mid-July," he said.
If plans continue to go as hoped, the construction will be right on schedule. "So far, so good", McKnight said.
"We did have a couple of false starts," said McKnight, "but we did open the pool today [last Tuesday] and we had a good crowd despite the windy weather."
Swimming lessons have started at the pool and the old water slide has been left in place at the request of the swimming instructors because they use it in their instruction of the beginning classes.
Mayor Mark Jones asked if the slide had not been a problem last year.
McKnight said that a new water supply had been added to the slide which would make it so that it was slick once again and would not catch the tender skin of smaller children. However, he said, once the new slide was in place, he doubted that the old slide would be as popular.
"Our city crews have torn out and replaced the old boiler (used to heat the water in the pool)," said McKnight.
The old boiler has been replaced with a set of smaller boilers that will add efficiencies to the heating process. Those new boilers will also make it easier to repair equipment in the future.
The crews have also installed the new fittings needed and have reconnected the water treatment system so that the disinfection chemical can be placed in the water to provide for the safety of patrons.
Under the new slide area some concrete was removed and new concrete was placed in the same area. It was used for a test to determine the concrete color and finish.
Lisa Brough, council member, said that she had seen the concrete in passing and thought that the color would be good.
"Some finesse is required in determining the finish," said McKnight.
The finish must be rough enough to keep people from slipping and yet smooth enough to keep from tearing up the bottoms of little feet.
Very large concrete tanks were installed to hold the water so that chemical can be mixed in and held in the storage tanks for a period of time so that the water can be properly treated before it is released.
A building will be constructed to go around those tanks, he said.
"The footings for the wading pool have been set," said McKnight. "The liner is set to arrive here on Thursday and will take about one week to install. That installation is the key event that the contractors have been waiting for."
The crew has flown into Utah and will begin work immediately.
The climbing wall is being shipped and should soon arrive, he said.
"All of the receivers for the water features are underground and the concrete has been placed around those receivers," McKnight said.
As soon as those have been inspected, the water features can begin to be installed.
Five or six trees had to be removed from the park to make way for the splash pad to be built but none of them were trees which had been planted to commemorate the early pioneer families who were the first residents of the community.
"None of the trees removed were heritage trees," said McKnight.
If the pool had been constructed some place where there were not trees, it would be easier to keep leaves out of the pool but, as a trade-off, there would not be the park-like feel.
Some of the large trees, during windstorms, for example, create some extra work in cleaning the leaves and twigs out of the pool. That should not be a problem in the future, however.
"In the future, we will cover the pool each night," said McKnight.
Two days after the last concrete is poured, the surface can be used.
"I was surprised to learn that," said Jones.
Of course, that does not mean that heavy equipment can be driven on it but people can walk and run on it.
City crews are building a nice wrought-iron fence to surround the pool but it is taking time since they are having to do the construction pole by pole, McKnight said. The fence will be one to be proud of when it is done.
The crew did deserve a great deal of thanks for the hard work they had done to help the project along.
