Photo via savekiddspringspool.com

Photo via savekiddspringspool.com

The Dallas Park Department presented its revised preliminary aquatics plan to City Council members this week, and it calls for extensive renovations at two Oak Cliff pools.

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An old plan, written in 2012 and approved by the park board in 2014, called for closing all of the city’s aging pools, including Kidd Springs, in favor of three water parks and five new community pools.

This new plan, funded by the sale of parkland at Lake Ray Hubbard, would cost about $52.8 million to implement.

Kidd Springs Park would become a “community aquatics center” with a $4.5 million renovation. That could include creating a “beach entry” with a slope instead of steps, a wading pool for small children and more. A community meeting is set for 6 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 22 at Kidd Springs Park. Neighborhood input will determine what amenities the pool will have.

The plan also selects Martin Weiss Pool for renovation, although that would be paid for in a future bond election, and the earliest one could be in 2017.

Neighbor Becky Moffett and the Kidd Springs Park Sailfish swim team this summer raised more than $25,000 for the pool in a swim-a-thon this past summer. Another $5,000 came from donors via the team’s savekiddspringspool.com. Raising that kind of cash and garnering a huge amount of neighborhood support shows the city how important the pool is to our community, Moffett says. Usage and community support are among the criteria the city considered for which pools to keep open.

Moffett hopes to raise a total of $50,000, which could be used for extras such as furniture and shade structures, she says.

Kidd Springs Park pool was built in 1958 and is one of the best attended city pools with 12,742 visits in 2014, about 203 people a day. Martin Weiss pool was built in 1953, and it’s also popular. It had 10,471 visits in 2014, about 140 people a day.