Concord is unique in its commitment to the neighborhood pool with seven for its less than 50,000 residents.  

“Seven pools are a lot for a community of this size,” Parks and Recreation Director David Gill said. “Each pool has a different character, which is important in the neighborhood.”

First built in 1938, the pool at Garrison Park is located off North State Street, next door to the First Start Children’s Center and the city’s water treatment plant on Penacook Lake. Unlike many other city pools, it borders a treeline and is often shaded. 

“The environment of that particular pool compared to others in the city is just really nice and very peaceful and quiet,” said resident Megan Bresnahan. “There just really isn't another pool like it.”

As the city updates its public pools one by one, some officials recommended that Garrison Pool — up for renovations this year — be transformed into a splash pad like the one opened at White Park last summer. Citing the lack of parking at Garrison and wanting to keep a swimming attraction other than the river for older youth and adults in the area, just under two dozen residents said at a public input meeting Tuesday night that they strongly opposed the idea.

With colorful spray features but no standing water, splash pads are aimed at young children. The one at White Park — which replaced a less than three-foot-deep children’s pool — last summer drew more than 11,000 attendees, smashing attendance records for any single neighborhood “pool” since the city started counting two decades ago. Splash pads also only require one lifeguard on duty — a pool needs three — meaning they are easier to staff and, therefore, can be open longer into the shoulder seasons. 

Those at the meeting, including those who said they have young children, said a pool was the best fit for Garrison because of its walkability for residents of all ages and quiet atmosphere. They felt splash pads were exclusively appealing to a narrow age group.

“After my kids are gone, I’ll still live in my house and I'll still want to swim and my husband will still want to swim,” Sheila Mullen said.

Attendees also worried a splash pad at Garrison would overwhelm its parking availability. Adults and teens can walk or bike to a pool but young kids, especially if drawn on the scale they were to White Park, are far more likely to come by car, several residents said. Garrison has limited space to add more parking, Gill said. The small lot includes spaces for those who want to use the pool and the basketball court.

“Splash pads are really for the younger ones, and we have one of those in town. So if you're going to drive to a splash pad, drive to White Park,” said Shawna Lavoie, a staff member at Beaver Meadow School.

Because of the area’s demographics, others were concerned that, with Garrison turned into a splash pad, older kids in the area would either walk to the river or miss out on city pools altogether.

“I also know a lot of kids that don't have parents that have cars — or have one car but one parent takes that car to work. So they're sitting home all day with nothing to do and nowhere to go," Lavoie said. “They're walking distance to the pool, but they're not splash pad kids.” 

“The residents in the area of the city need a place to teach their children how to swim other than the Merrimack River,” Paul Lillios said.

The reasons Concord should keep a pool at Garrison were accompanied by pleas for the current pool to reopen. 

The city has been down lifeguards for several years. While pay and certification costs played a role, so did a nationwide lifeguard shortage: for two years during the pandemic, it was either not possible or very difficult to get certified, hugely disrupting the training and hiring cycle for lifeguards, Gill said. 

Garrison pool was closed for all of the last four summers and for most of the summer of 2019. The city was not able to staff all of its pools and, because Garrison historically had the lowest attendance, it was the pool the city chose not to open. Citing that history, Concord’s Recreation and Parks Advisory Committee recommended that city leaders put in a splash pad at Garrison instead of a new pool. 

Residents said Tuesday that logic dominating renovation talks so far had presented a false choice — one between a pool that is closed or a splash pad that is open. They urged the city to weigh other factors behind which pool should be closed and to consider rotating closures when necessary. 

Attendance data from before the pandemic is out of date, Bresnahan said. Because of births and home sales in the area, Garrison might see more usage if it were to be reopened.

“I just don't think that the decision-making around old use data really reflects the needs of this community,” she said.

Whatever water feature is put in at Garrison, the reasoning and data that led the city to close Garrison may not be what it uses to determine future closures, should they be necessary, Gill said after the meeting.

Overall, residents were clear: they miss Garrison Pool.

“I'm feeling for the neighborhood,” said Jennifer Kretovic, the Ward 3 city councilor. “We've tolerated for four years not having any pool, except for a very brief time. … There were other pools that were just as close and low attendance, but we were put to the bottom of the list, instead of being rotated.” 

City councilors will make the final call on the pool’s future as part of next year’s budget later this spring. A splash pad would be about $100,000 more expensive than the $650,000 for a pool replacement currently sketched out for next year, according to Gill.