After more than 30 years of planning and hoping, an aquatic center for the City of Mobile is about to become reality.
On Monday, the Mobile County Commission approved a $23,151,607 bid from Persons Services Group to build Phase I of the center, which includes a 50-meter outdoor pool, which includes dive wells, along with an indoor portion that will be an instructional warm-up pool. There will also be lockers and restrooms, as well as parking.
The bid includes $19 million from the county plus an additional $3.5 million from the city and the Mobile County Public School System.
Designed by Williams Blackstock Architects, construction is expected to begin in September 2024, with completion anticipated in approximately 12 to 18 months.
The aquatic center will be developed in phases. The 40,000-square-foot facility’s Phase I will feature an outdoor 25-yard by 50-meter competition pool with two dive wells, a check-in/concessions building, an indoor warm-up/instructional pool, locker rooms, restrooms, and 176 parking spaces.
Future Phase II plans include an indoor 25-yard by 25-meter competitive pool, spectator seating for 645, a lobby, offices, and additional concessions, with the estimated price between $8 and $10 million.
The Mobile County Aquatic Center will offer a range of programs including swimming and diving practice, competitive opportunities for high school, youth, and masters swim clubs and teams, recreational swimming, aquatic exercise, various instructional programs, and underwater ROV practice and competitions for robotics teams. Local first responders, including the Mobile County Sheriff’s Office, police and fire departments, the Marine Corps, and the Coast Guard, will also utilize the facility for in-water training.
“This is tremendous,” said Mobile County Commissioner Connie Hudson, who along with many in the swimming community had been trying to get an aquatic center for the city of Mobile. “We’ve been waiting so long and hoping and getting everything lined up together, and finally today we did.
“We finally got it approved, and the work starts now. Withing the next couple of weeks, we’ll set a groundbreaking, and hopefully in the next 12-18 months we’ll have the first phase fixed and we’ll have swimmers out there. It’s exciting; words can hardly describe it at this moment.
“For the community, it’s a tremendous achievement. We have so much interest in this area in competitive swimming; we have people who are interested in recreational swimming, and interest in people who are training for lifeguard duties and scuba diving. There are so many aspects that the community is interested in., and this will meet the needs of the community.”
Hudson said many years ago, there were feasibility studies done, but nothing came to fruition until in the last few years.
“We were fortunate to pull everything together, and the team, which includes City of Mobile Swim Association (CMSA) folks and our county team have been working their hearts to bring this to fruition,” she said. “Everything just lined up. The stars are aligned, and that’s where we are at this moment.
“We need to compete with other urban areas, not only throughout the state but throughout the region. We haven’t had the facilities, but we will. It’s going to really grow tremendously. We have about a thousand young people (here in Mobile) who are involved with swimming in one form or another. Once we have the facilities in place, we’re going to see it (that number) grow exponentially.”
“I look at this as a transformative project,” said Tyler Kerns, coach of CMSA and who has coached numerous swimmers, including Mobile’s Paige Madden, who won two gold medals at the Paris Olympics. “Our goal is to give every kid in the Mobile County area that opportunity to do swimming, as well as masters swimming.
“We obviously want to grow our competitive program and give other teams throughout the Southeast to make this something impactful for our community at multi-levels.
“This is a huge investment for sports tourism,” said Mobile Sports Authority executive director Danny Corte. “We have been missing out on some of the larger swim meets over the years because of our facilities, and as well as Bishop State has hosted the city championships, it was just outdated in the atmosphere of hosting regional and national meets.”
“This is 30 years in the making; it’s been a long time,” said Daryl Gomien, vice-president of the City of Mobile Swim Association (CMSA) and who also serves on the board of directors of the Mobile Sports Authority. “When we teamed up with Commissioner Hudson, we just got behind her and are thankful that she was able to move this thing forward.
“The sweet thing is that with the new facility, we’ll have more swimmers coming here, and it’s unbelievable that we’ll have more room. The economic impact of this whole thing, you can’t put a number on that because there are so many families coming in. Thousands of dollars every week they’ll spend to swim here.”
Gomien said that Bishop State, where the Mobile County Aquatic League hosted its annual championships, will still be used as a facility.
“If there are major storms, it’ll be a place where we can go,” he said.
For Riley Childress, Gomien’s daughter, the prospect of having a new facility speaks volumes. She was selected as the Female Swimmer of the Year by CMSA and the Mobile Optimist Club for her performance in the city championships, and is currently attending St. Paul’s.
“I’m so excited about the new facility because the pool is crowded down at Bishop,” she said. “I feel like having a better facility will bring more swimmers for our team. It’ll bring bigger meets, and with the bigger meets, we’ll have bigger pools.”
Courtesy of Call News.
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