Why Wheeling could get a new, multimillion-dollar aquatic center
After 32 years of splish-splashing fun, Wheeling Park District officials think the Family Aquatic Center is due for an overhaul.
The center, at 105 Community Blvd., has reached the end of its reasonable life expectancy, district Executive Director Jan Buchs said. While the facility is safe and looks great to the visitors who enjoy it each summer, maintaining equipment that’s underground and concealed by a large, decorative rock structure is a costly business, she said.
“What has become problematic over time is the deteriorating underground infrastructure and the obsolete mechanical systems behind the rock structure that keep everything functioning,” Buchs said. “The things that our guests don’t see are the issue.”
As such, district officials and consultants are developing plans for an all-new aquatic center that essentially would be built where the current, 4-acre facility operates. The project could cost between $27 million and $34 million, depending on the final design and features, Buchs said. Funding would come from district reserves.
Wheeling’s park district isn’t the only one upgrading aquatic facilities lately. The Arlington Heights Park District will build a new swimming pool at Recreation Park as part of a $24 million project, and the 40-year-old Big Surf Pool at Mount Prospect’s Lions Memorial Park will be replaced as part of a taxpayer-approved, $46 million project. The Cary Park District replaced an aging community pool with the Sunburst Aquatic Center in 2022.
‘Significant deteriorations’
Open since 1993, Wheeling’s Family Aquatic Center cost $5.6 million to construct. Believed to be among the first of its kind in the suburbs, the center features tube and body slides, a zero-depth pool, a picnic area, locker rooms, a concession stand and many more amenities.
One of the big attractions is Tsunami Splash — an elevated, gigantic bucket that, when it fills with water, tips over and soaks anyone beneath it before resetting and filling up again.
That splash bucket, a separate splash pool with water basketball and other elements were added in 2003 as part of a $1.6 million addition.
District officials last year hired the Counsilman-Hunsaker aquatic engineering firm to evaluate the center’s condition. The consultants found “significant deteriorations” in the pools and pool systems, documents indicate, as well as in the rocks that conceal the mechanical systems and support structures for the water slides and waterfalls.
“Over time, the rock structures have developed cracks and leaks beneath the slides and waterfall area, creating rust and corrosion in mechanical areas and support beams,” Buchs explained. “Staff have filled some of the rock structure areas with concrete to mitigate structural failure.”
Buchs insists the issues pose no danger to guests or employees. The consultants’ report can be found online at tinyurl.com/2pd4c22y.
Planning a new park
The park board took the next step this past May by hiring Confluence, a landscape architecture and planning firm, to design a new water park.
The latest version of the plan envisions a new park on essentially the same footprint as the current facility, but slightly to the southwest.
The centerpiece would be a 16,500-square-foot pool with a zero-depth area, a diving board in the deep end and other amenities. Two body slides and a drop slide would be built elsewhere on the property, as would a resort-style pool designed for grown-ups.
“It’s essentially a place where the adults can have a little space to themselves,” Confluence senior principal Terry Berkbuegler told the park district board last week.
A 5,600-square-foot play structure and wet deck is planned, as are a splash pad, a bath house, a concession area and a space featuring cabanas that could be rented.
“(It’s an) easy revenue-generating opportunity,” Berkbuegler said.
The plans don’t include a tube slide, lap lanes in the pools or new versions of some land-based recreational features on the northeast side of the property.
Parks officials haven’t decided if Willie the Whale — the small slide that’s now in a shallow area of the main pool — will be saved.
Commissioner Cheri Klumpp is among those who want to keep the light-blue imitation cetacean.
“Don’t free Willie,” she told Berkbuegler last week.
Buchs expects the board will decide this fall whether to greenlight construction.
Summer fun
More than 345,000 people have visited Wheeling’s Family Aquatic Center over the past five years.
2025: 45,660 (through July 20)
2024: 78,151
2023: 81,502
2022: 74,602
2021: 65,719
· Source: Wheeling Park District