New pool splashing ahead: Sports clubs drive design
Public to guide amenity choices
FORT ST. JOHN – In their determination to get a new aquatic facility built, the City has floated just one design concept for Council’s perusal.
This design – which Deputy Chief Administrative Officer Darrell Blades emphasized is a concept, rather than a building plan – is a site-specific high-level concept that the working group pulled together in the past couple of weeks. Not only is it a fresh concept, thanks in part to having a location on which to build it, but the design strongly favours the inputs Council received on December 8, 2025, from local competitive sports groups.
Phase 1 of the design includes the eight 25m lanes the Inconnu Swim Club asked for, plus three warm-water lanes, bringing the total to 11. Plenty of room for swimming lessons, aquafit, club practices, and club growth through 2040.
In addition to the lap pool, which will feature 1m and 3m diving boards, the leisure pool section includes a warm water tot pool and a splash pad, as well as a lazy river, and one waterslide. It also includes an accessible hot tub, sauna and a steam room.
A fieldhouse, whose general specs are based on present and future needs provided to Council by FSJ Minor Soccer, will make up the rest of Phase 1. The fieldhouse will be a full field of 110m x 70m, which can be divided into smaller fields to accommodate training and practices, while being large enough to host competitions, something the group finds challenging in the current Kids Arena Fieldhouse.
For Phase 2, the concept includes gymnasium space and an outdoor soccer pitch.
Both phases would share a lobby and social space, public washrooms, a multi-purpose room, a café, spectator seating and parking.
Although the project is divided into two phases, Blades said that they’d like council “to consider pricing Phase 1 and 2 now, and the full scope, and based on what is acceptable for costs to the public we can consider doing them both at the same time or doing them separate.”
The intent is to do Phase 1 and 2 separately, with Phase 1 housing all the mechanical so that Phase 2 can be built later without having to renovate Phase 1 to fit Phase 2.
Blades says he doesn’t foresee another referendum being needed to go ahead with Phase 2, it would simply come down to a borrowing decision from council.
“Gymnasiums on their own aren’t nearly as expensive as building a fieldhouse or aquatic centre,” he said.
The report to council following the presentation is about whether council wants the working group to price the main priority, Phase 1, or both phases, Blades said.
During the discussion following the presentation from Blades and Community Services Director Kylah Bryde, Councillor Gord Klassen wondered if the proposed facility is bigger than needed, citing similar-sized pools in municipalities such as Vancouver, Surrey and Kamloops, municipalities which are considerably larger than Fort St. John.
Blades replied that they “been conservative on the growth – at the end of the day 1.8 percent is pretty much what our average growth is, and then we went out to 2050 as a benchmark, which would be about half-life for this facility.
“We really need to get 50 years out of this next pool.”
He added that while the average age of our population is increasing, the city still has a very young population, and he believes they’re sizing it right for 50-year growth.
“Why are we including the population from outside Fort St. John in our growth figures, when it’s the Fort St. John taxpayers that are going to pay for it? Should we not just build it for whatever we need in the city, and if rural wants to kick in some money, we’ll build it bigger,” Klassen asked.
Our rural residents use all the amenities in the city, Blades said. “Not planning to be able to handle the rural population would put us behind, and then our residents would be getting bumped out, or you’d have to have a system where city of Fort St. John resident go in this line, rural residents in this line, and when we fill up, we turn people away.”
This will be a regional facility, Blades said, no matter how they get to the paying and operating expenses of it.
Councillor Tony Zabinsky was concerned about the tax implications not only of construction, but the operation of the facility as well, and asked if all that information would be available when the City goes to the Trade Show in April.
“There’s still a lot of unknowns,” Blades said. “One of the factors that we are considering – we went out to the public, and the majority came back that they’d be comfortable with $30-$40 additional tax for the construction of a new facility.”
But because the current pool, although operated by the City, is owned by the Peace River Regional District which shoulders some of the burden of operational costs, 100 percent of the new pool will be borne by the City.
“I think we can estimate what the operating cost for the new facility would be, based on the direction we receive today for April, but the actual impact to taxpayers we won’t know until we know what participation is,” Blades said.
They might be able to project a maximum cost to taxpayers, but final numbers won’t be available until the particulars of participation are nailed down.
“Our intent is to lower it through partnerships, or sub-regional rec agreements, or a two-tiered system or different opportunities before we get to the final number.”
Next steps for the project kicked off on January 13 with the launching of the public engagement, through the City’s Let’s Talk Aquatics Facility website and survey. The City is seeking input on several design options and amenity priorities. The survey is open until February 1st.
Once the survey results have been compiled by the working group, the amenities will be finalized, detailed site plans and facility designs will be developed, the City will explore various funding sources including grants, partnerships, cost-sharing, sponsorships and borrowing, prepare cost estimates and determine potential tax impacts for property owners.
At the Regular Council meeting following the Committee of the Whole and the presentation, Council voted to move ahead with pricing of both phases.
The City plans to have all this information available in time for the Trade Show in April, ahead of the planned October referendum to be held in conjunction with the municipal election.