HICKORY, N.C.,None — City workers began demolition on Tuesday of two Hickory public pools that have been around for almost half a century.
Some community members protested the decision to close the pools, but the city said it would be too expensive to make repairs needed to keep them open.
Workers took down the slide and removed the picnic tables at the pool in the Ridgeview community, then carted off the pool's pump.
"All of our grocery stores are gone, most of our Laundromats are gone, (and) now the swimming pool," area resident Belinda Morgan said.
The concrete around the pools in Ridgeview and west Hickory will be ripped up and then the pools will be filled with dirt. The land will then be covered in grass and turned into open areas at the parks.
The pools were closed two and a half years ago after the city learned the drains and other equipment needed to be replaced at a cost of more than $700,000.
City leaders held community meetings and did phone surveys in an effort to come up with ways to save the pools, but funding problems persisted.
"We're very committed to recreation. We are still heavily investing in recreation and will continue to," City Manager Mick Berry said. "It is just going to be the right timing and the right project."
The beginning of the demolition was difficult for people like Charles Simms, who said he learned to swim at the Ridgeview pool and then taught his children to swim there.
"It's kind of bad. It takes all of the old history away," he said.
The Hickory City Council has asked the Parks and Recreation Commission to include aquatics in its 2011-12 work plan. City leaders are expecting an update during their March 1 meeting.
WSOC
