New aquatics, fitness center set for September opening
A new 22,196-square-foot, $35.7 million Miwok Aquatics and Fitness Center under construction at the college’s Indian Valley campus in Novato should be open sometime in September,” said Isidro Farias, director of capital projects for the College of Marin.
A 22,196-square-foot fitness center with three swimming pools is almost ready for prime time in Novato, officials said this week.
“Our completion date is Aug. 31,” Isidro Farias, director of capital projects for the College of Marin, said of the new $35.7 million Miwok Aquatics and Fitness Center under construction at the college’s Indian Valley campus in Novato. “Probably it will be open sometime during September.”
Farias made his comments following Tuesday’s college board of trustees meeting, during which the board approved spending $91,142 on a laundry list of remaining equipment needed to finish construction on the three outdoor swimming pools. The Miwok center will have a 50-meter main pool, a smaller warming pool and a dive pool with a support center and tower.
The items on the list include such things as lifeguard chairs, lane lines, backstroke stanchions and water polo goals. On Tuesday, trustees approved the low bid, out of three bids submitted, from Concord-based Lincoln Aquatics.
The Miwok facility will replace the current IVC pool that is used by college students and staff and the public. The new fitness center, which also includes a gym, a wood-floored aerobics classroom and a weights room, is being built mostly with taxpayer-approved Measure B bond funds.
In addition to the Measure B funds, approximately $8.5 million of the total cost is coming from a private donation earmarked for the dive pool tower and support center building. That donation is being offered anonymously and was accepted by the trustees last year.
At issue now is what to do with the 740,000 gallons of water in the IVC pool. That pool will eventually be drained and then filled in with soil and capped, Farias said.
“We’re looking at a way to reuse the water from the existing pool,” Farias told trustees. “We want to be responsible stewards of our environmental resources.”
Farias said the original plan was to transfer the IVC pool water to the three new pools, which will require 1.26 million gallons of water total. However, the plaster contractor for the pools said using the existing water — with whatever chemicals it has in it — would nullify the firm’s warranty.
Therefore, the college is looking for a different water reuse plan, Farias said.
“Some of it the college can use for dust control and landscaping,” Farias said. “The rest we will offer to public agencies, such as the city of Novato, Marin County and other nonprofit groups and agencies.”
The college met this week with Novato Fire Protection District officials to see if they would be able to use the water. Farias said there are some issues regarding meters on fire hydrants, so it was not immediately clear if that could be a possible reuse.
Work on the pools began in the fall of 2018, but was delayed during the pandemic and amid the winter rains.
Of the aquatic and fitness center’s total 22,196 square feet, 18,190 square feet will be in the main building, 986 square feet in the dive center support building and 3,020 square feet in the three pools’ mechanical building.
When it opens, the new center will be the second major building completed with Measure B funds at the Novato campus within the last year. In October, the college announced the opening of the Bill and Adele Jonas Center, a 15,600-square-foot conference center, on campus.
Other College of Marin Measure B projects under way at the moment include a new Bolinas Marine and Science Lab along the Bolinas Lagoon and a Learning Resources Center at the Kentfield campus.
The Bolinas project is in the preliminary construction phase following demolition of the old facility earlier this year. The Kentfield learning center is still in the design phases.