Just four years after it was constructed, the splash park at Heritage Square is in need of a major upgrade.
At the regular meeting of the Taylor City Council Aug. 24, city leaders voted unanimously to award a contract in the amount of $606,512.89 to Kraftsman Commercial Playgrounds & Water Parks to repair the splash pad, which will involve injecting a chemical into the subbase to strengthen it and replace the concrete to prevent future shifting and movement at the surface level, among other upgrades.
“I’m glad to see this happening because I knew we had a problem when I saw more kids playing in the puddle of water than the splash pad,” said District 1 Councilman Gerald Anderson.
City spokeswoman Stacey Osborne said the splash pad, as well as other improvements to Heritage Square, were originally completed by contractor Baird/ Williamson with a bid for approximately $235,000 in 2018.
According to city documents, by the summer of 2021, city staff noticed standing water against the east side wall, which city engineers determined were due to the outer panels of the on the east side of the pad settling, causing the water to bypass drains, prompting.
"The ground in this location is moving six inches. That’s a substantial number, even for Taylor to move up and down six inches during shrink and swell periods of the soil.”
- Taylor city engineer Jacob Walker
City staff to hire a company to inject foam underneath to raise the panels.
However, that repair didn’t last long, said Parks and Recreation Director Tyler Bybee at the meeting.
“By that next fall (2022), we started seeing sinking on this side, and that’s when we started thinking we had a more serious problem than just panels shifting. We did some drain investigation and some leak testing, and we found that we know of four leaks under the pad,” Bybee said. “We isolated those and turned them off. We have tried to do things as far as blocking the water and keeping it from rolling down.”
Last December, the council approved a contract in the amount of $362,036.91 to the same vendor for repairs to the pad, pending a geotechnical investigation, which subsequently found a much larger problem than staff had originally anticipated, said Bybee.
“Geotechnical analysis has been performed,” he said. “That’s just boring down into the pad itself. I think we did four locations 15-feet down. So, you pull that out and analyze it.”
City engineer Jacob Walker said the investigation showed the ground at and around the splash pad moving dramatically.
“The ground in this location is moving six inches,” Walker said. “That’s a substantial number, even for Taylor to move up and down six inches during shrink and swell periods of the soil. So, we have pipes coming from the pump house coming into the pad that are broken ... So, the strategy has been to get this splash pad at a movement level of one inch and then to get the outer rim (also).”
While city leaders expressed their frustration over the cost of the repair, there was unanimous agreement that it was needed.
At-large Councilman Dwayne Ariola said the city’s engineering firm, HDR, which he has repeatedly praised for their work, was brought in specifically to remedy this situation.
“Is $600,000 a lot of money for a splash pad? Absolutely,” Ariola said. “That’s only four years old? And it’s not due to anybody up here on council because we trusted our advisors, so I am going to trust you Mr. Walker and your firm to deliver this project, but man, God help you if it happens in another four years.”
District 4 Councilman Robert Garcia echoed this frustration.
“It is unfortunate that we are where we are at, especially when you trust certain individuals to deliver, and unbeknownst to us up here we thought they were doing the right thing, and they weren’t, so we had the option of just not fixing it and let it go down or actually fixing it,” Garcia said. “And it is our motion to fix this because we know how important it is to the community so I am upset that we are where we are at, and I know we discussed previously that we could take legal action, but the costs would outweigh the benefits.”
Bybee concurred that spending such a sum was hard to swallow, but necessary.
“There are a lot of projects and a lot of needs across the park system and it’s frustrating to have to spend that amount of dollars on something that is that age,” Bybee said. “And, our guys are spending a lot of man hours moving barriers around, maintaining it and checking it and it shouldn’t have to be like that. We had Robinson (Park). Luckily, it ran really well this summer. It was a great asset, but I think having both of them will be (better). We need it if it’s going to be this hot.”
"Is $600,000 a lot of money for a splash pad? Absolutely. That’s only four years old?”
-At-large Councilman Dwayne Ariola
