Miller Park Pool
The City of Omaha chose the same team that had worked on Papio Bay to reinvigorate this pool that was built in the mid-twentieth century, and had seen better days. The deeper, competition-style pool was not condusive to making this a fun family experience, so the pool itself was demolished with the current pooll structure built in its place. The bath house was maintained and made fresh and airy by removing a portion of the roof and a concessions area.
The dragon was a “must-have” by the Parks Department, so the design of the pool revolved mostly around that monster. Other opportunities that were worked through:
Having concessions deck areas separate from the pool deck (but somewhat unnoticeable except for signage).
Two different slides (a minimum of one needed to be fully accessible). This slide tower gave the opportunity to align a new craftsman-style structure with the new raised wooden roof over the new spine of the historic shower/guard house. An eight-foot diameter clock facing the pool gives time that’s easy to read to all patrons of the establishment.
Making a pool equipment / chemical storage / life-guard break room was just the human-sized structure that was needed to counterbalance all of these large design gestures…and keep the sea monster from coming out of the water!