City agrees to review plan for co-ed change rooms at new outdoor pool

The City of Edmonton will review plans for the new Queen Elizabeth Pool after meeting with a citizens' group that threatened to withhold $300,000 in funding when it learned the pool would not have separate male and female change rooms.

The outdoor pool's original plan had what the city called a "universal" change room with approximately 25 compartments with doors on them so people could change in privacy. 

The design feature raised the ire of the Friends of the Queen Elizabeth Pool Society, and earlier this week, the group threatened to withhold its contribution until the city put in separate change rooms for men and women.

On Thursday afternoon, the city announced it was reviewing the design after meeting with society representatives.

"In the coming weeks, the city will review the design based on safety considerations, the requirements of potential users of the pool and effective use of taxpayer dollars,"  Linda Cochrane, general manager of community services, said in a news release.

"The safety of citizens using city facilities is paramount. While no design guarantees a facility will be incident-free, minimizing risk is always taken into account during the planning, design and operation of facilities.

"The goal remains to see the new Queen Elizabeth Outdoor Pool opened in the summer 2010."

The city will make no further statements on the issue until a decision on the pool design is made, the city news release said.

The Friends of Queen Elizabeth Pool Society raised $400,000 to go toward the $5.5 million pool. It has already given the city $100,000 of that funding.