Work begins on new $16m pool for Cambridge
Cambridge’s long-awaited $16.7 million swimming pool is just over a year away from completion.
The multi-million dollar price tag includes $1.8m being spent in the current financial year, with construction having already begun.
A total of $2m of external fundraising is also targeted.
The rest is laid out in the council’s draft 10-year plan, released for public consultation.
‘‘The Cambridge pool has been a project that the new council, when I came on board four years ago, were absolutely determined to get the concept agreed and this pool built,’’ Cambridge ward councillor Liz Stolwyk said.
‘‘That is what we’ve done. The old facility was not going to cater for all the needs of the community, in the sense it was only open for a short period of the year.’’
The new facility will be open 12 months of the year and the current outdoor pool will be retained, as that’s what the public wanted.
‘‘Yes, there’s a much higher price tag that comes with that,’’ Stolwyk said. ‘‘But we know that our community is growing very, very quickly, and that it will be well received.’’
The new pool complex will open in early 2019.
The current 50m outdoor pool will be upgraded and the centre will comprise a new 10-lane indoor pool, a learner’s pool, a hydrotherapy pool, spa and sauna, and a children’s splash pad.
When the pool project was considered in council’s previous 10-year plan in 2015, the budget set for that version was $9.9m.
But following public consultation, the current, more expensive plan was developed, in which ratepayers requested the additional features.
The design of the frontage to the pools on Williamson Street will also be altered to allow for bikes and mobility scooters.
Project manager Lorraine McKendrick said last year Cambridge and Maungatautari ratepayers would carry the major costs, after some councillors from outside of Cambridge complained about the bill of over $16m.