Friends Of Barton Springs Pool
Barton Springs Eternal!
Posts about volunteer opportunities.
Hi friends!
The Good News:
The pool re-opens June 9th! The pool will open every day at 5 a.m. for a swim-at-your-own risk session until 7 a.m. On Tuesday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, following an hour of cleaning, the pool will be open for 2-hour reservations between 8 a.m. and 10 p.m. Get your reservations at austintexas.gov !
The Bad News:
We don’t have a date for our next volunteer pool cleaning session yet. Stay tuned!
Friends of Barton Springs Pool has monthly Volunteer Pool Cleanings on the First Thursday of every month, beginning March 5, 2020.
Join us for one (or more) 2-hour shifts starting at 9am.
Come see the pool in its pristine and uncrowded state. While you’ll be helping “give back” to Barton Springs Pool, you’ll find that you’ve also given yourself the best feeling, too.
Volunteers can help with push-brooming the pool bottom of the shallow end. Scrubbing algae from the sides, rails, and stairs. Helping with landscape efforts to beautify the grounds with weeding, spreading and turning the mulch. Lending a hand wherever needed to make the pool and grounds as clean and beautiful as possible.
Bring a friend if you can. Come prepared to get wet, have a snack, and enjoy the company of other Barton Springs Pool enthusiasts!
ENTRANCE NOTE: The pool is closed on Thursdays. You’ll still come in the main entrance. Our check-in station is right outside the main office. Speak friend and enter!
Join the facebook event and share with/invite your friends! https://www.facebook.com/events/1762852917179475/
Friends,
We are fast approaching the end of the pool cleaning season with Sept. 5 and Oct. 3 being the last of the first Thursday dates to volunteer, along with Councils Cleans the Pool on Thursday (Oct. 24). The season has been very successful working with corporate sponsors like AMD, C3 Presents, Wholefoods along with teams from all walks of life like ABGB, BRC Recovery, Austin Allies, Austin Youthworks, Progress Texas, and of course our loyal Friends! Folks, when you add up all the people/hours, we put up staggering numbers — 500+ volunteers putting in 3000+ volunteer hours at the pool!
WE THANK ALL OF YOU!!
Aquatic plants in the pool update. We have a new approach that takes into account some successes that were realized in the past along with a better commitment from PARD and Watershed. FBSP will be leading a team that will help with planting and maintaining the plants. To better prepare the plants, we are going to create a nursery. The planting will be done during the scheduled partial draw-downs of the pool to make it easier and safer. If anyone is interested in finding out more about this effort, check out our website or email me at president@friendsofbartonspringspool.org
Speaking of partial draw-downs, FBSP has been advocating for this since 2006 as a way of improving water quality. When the pool is drawn down, it kills the algae in the shallow end, and BSP Staff is able to get the bobcat with the power brush and hoses (Broom Brigade on steroids…) to wash away the organics and make it less slippery for swimmers.
WE COMMEND PARD and AQUATICS FOR MAKING THIS HAPPEN!
Opening up the upper dam to creek flow something that we have been advocating for since 2006. I could go on and on about the benefits and I encourage anyone interested in learning more to refer to the Barton Springs Pool Master Plan. The good news is Watershed recognized the benefits and took on this project. Furthermore, they have progressed to the point where they hired an engineering firm to design the gates, and develop a plan for when to take advantage of creek flow in the pool. We have been involved all along the way with meetings and discussions and are looking forward to seeing what they have designed. We encourage everyone to support this effort, again if you are interested in finding out more about this effort email me at president@friendsofbartonspringspool.org
WE THANK WATERSHED FOR TAKING ON THIS PROJECT!
Barton Creek Safety update. Joe Riddell, a long-time environmental activist and avid kayaker of the creek, has led this charge and succeeded in getting the Environmental Board to create a resolution to council for “Safety improvements above Barton Springs Pool for inner-tubers and boaters” (Environmental Commission Motion 20190619 007b). In the short term, you should be seeing some signs over the creek and a temporary location for getting off the creek upstream from the upper dam. In the long term, a more formal way to safely get off the creek will be installed near where the gravel trap dam was. Another area of concern that sadly resulted in a drowning at the inlet to the bypass tunnel will be to make changes to the inlet gate to improve the safety.
WE THANK JOE RIDDELL AND SBCA FOR TAKING THIS ON!
Council Cleans the Pool is an event we have sponsored over the years and it is going to happen again on Thurs, October 24. Areas of interest for this event will be an update on Bathhouse Rehabilitation project, Barton Creek Safety, Upper Dam Protect, Zilker Park Master Plan, Repopulating Aquatic Plants, and identifying potential bond projects to benefit the park. Oh, and we also strongly encourage our mayor and council members to get in the pool, grab a broom and help put that shine on our beloved pool. We also hope to plant some trees again this year.
See you at the pool,
Steve Barnick, FBSP President
The good news is Barton Springs Pool will be open on July 4, so you can enjoy the cool pool on a Thursday.
The better news is that your Post-Patriotic Pool Cleaning will be next Thursday, July 11, 2019 (9am – 3pm)!!!!
At this great place we call Barton Springs,
the waters flow cool, clear and clean,
but to show our love true,
wear your red, white, and blue,
and join our post-patriotic volunteer team!
Please join Friends of Barton Springs Pool on Thursday, July 11 for one or more of our two-hour shifts, starting at 9:00, 11:00 and 1:00. We’ll have volunteers from C3 Presents, Benchmark Recovery Center, Austin Beer Garden Brewing Co., Austin Allies, and American Youthworks. Since the pool will be drawn down, most of volunteer efforts will be out of the water. Possible projects include helping remove the sludge that accumulates by the sediment fence, cleaning the rails, removing the gravel at the bypass inlet, tree trimming near Eliza Springs, weeding on the south side, gardening work on the front side of the bathhouse. With the pool drawn down, most of the activities will be dry, not wet, so we’ll need to find creative ways to keep cool, possibly including periodic visits to cool creek flow at Barking Springs.
So come roll up your sleeves, bring a friend, have a snack and enjoy the company of other Barton Springs enthusiasts. We look look forward to seeing you there!
Watershed divers are assessing the damage in the pool. The entire pool was scoured a lot of large rocks have been jostled about, and another large deposit of gravel is in the mix in the middle deep area of the pool.
