After years of planning and renovations, Lenexa’s “flagship outdoor pool” is ready to reopen to the public.
Following a two-year, $15-million redesign, Sar-Ko-Par Aquatic Center — formerly Indian Trails Aquatic Center — will open for the summer swim season on Saturday, May 25, with a new look and bevy of new amenities.
“The community was the one wanting something that had way more features to it,” said Mandy Danler, project manager and assistant director of Lenexa Parks and Recreation. “While it can be costly, that’s what they wanted. So we brought it all under here and did what we could to assure that we met those needs.”
The city wants it to be more inclusive and interactive
One of the big changes was adding zero-depth entry to the pool and a splash pad for children.
These are important additions for families with small children and people with disabilities, Danler said.
“It will be more interactive for kids to play and run through,” she said.
There’s a new lazy river
During the pool renovation’s two-year planning phase, a repeated complaint parks and recreation staff heard was people were tired of having to exit the water to navigate between amenities.
“It gets frustrating when you have to get out, your feet are burning, you’re running to the next amenity,” Danler said. “So it was really important for us to kind of come up with a design that had this flow to it.”
With its new 512-foot lazy river, that’s less of a worry.
It connects to several different parts of the center, including the children’s swimming area, as well as what Danler calls “The Active Zone” of the river, with more of a rapid-rushing flow and features like overhead water-dumping buckets. There’s also a slower area of the river where people can relax and float in the water.
New-look aquatic centers features two different slides
One of the big additions to the center was a water slide complex featuring a slower slide for single-person inner tubes slide and a speed slide.
“You’re sort of making a choice right at (the top) — ‘Do I want the slow side or the faster side?'” said Denise Rendina, director of communications for Lenexa.
The slide also connects to the lazy river.
The pool area has more amenities
Wanting to please those looking to swim, dive or climb, Lenexa Parks and Recreation added an eight-lane, 25-meter competition pool and deep-water alcove with a 3-meter platform and two 1-meter diving boards.
The two pools are connected and have added features like basketball hoops and two rock-climbing walls.
“We can have users on each one of those rock walls so they can race each other,” Danler said. “We can have users on the rock wall and have the (diving) boards functioning all at the same time.”
The center is modernized
With the original aquatic center, formerly known as Indian Trails Aquatic Center, being more than 45 years old, Danler said it was long overdue for big changes.
Beyond the pool, a new parking lot with 120 spaces was added, along with a road that gives vehicles easier access to the aquatic center’s entrance for drop-offs and pick-ups.
The city also kept the old concession area, but made it solar-powered.
The look of the park, from the additional shading structures to the slides, is also meant to be more colorful and engaging, featuring bright blues, oranges and yellows.
“We wanted it to be fun. We wanted people to come in and have it be bright and welcoming,” Danler said. “For it to be colorful was extremely important to us.”
The renovated center is ready for visitors
With all of the new features, as well as the pool being closed for all of 2023, city staff expect Sar-Ko-Par Aquatic Center to be bustling all summer long.
That’s not a worry, Danler said, as the center is staffed up and ready to welcome everyone.
“We do expect it to be extremely busy,” Danler said. “But I do feel like we’ve got great safety measures in place to ensure that everyone can come in and have a safe and fun time.”
Times and prices vary
Prices for admission to the pool are:
- Children 2 and younger: Free
- Resident: $9
- Nonresident: $12
- Senior (60+): $3 resident / $5 nonresident
- Pool memberships are available
The Sar-Ko-Park Aquatic Center, 8801 Greenway Ln., in Sar-Ko-Par Trails Park, will be open seven days a week from noon to 8 p.m.
For a list of rules and policies, as well as days when the pool is closed, check out the official Sar-Ko-Par Aquatic Center website.
Go deeper: Lenexa considers redesigned Indian Trails Aquatic Center — Here’s what it looks like
