Southwest Tennis Center: What the feasibility study’s showing so far

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(Bird’s-eye view “schematic” of proposed tennis center)

The idea of turning the six tennis courts west of Southwest Pool into an indoor tennis center is still in the early exploration stage.

But that’s the stage at which it’s important to talk things through, a lot, and about 50 people showed up to do that on Tuesday night at Chief Sealth International High School.

Lisa Corbin is the community member leading the campaign. She explained how the idea originated four years ago – the backstory’s on this fact sheet – and that a city Small and Simple grant was paying for a feasibility study by Jack Kamrath of Tennis Planning Consultants.

Kamrath said he’s in town to get the next part of that study going and expects to have it finished by summer’s end. The next phase will look at the potential market for the center and will focus on finding out how many people play tennis “from time to time” in order to gauge potential demand, which then would determine how many courts are needed. He’s already done two mapping surveys, one to determine how many people live within 15 minutes’ driving distance and how many live within 18 minutes. Those numbers, he said, range from 360,000 people to nearly 515,000.

Building this kind of structure, he said, would take about six months once permits are issued. The site (formerly part of the Denny International Middle School campus, still owned by Seattle Public Schools) already has power, water, sewer, drainage infrastructure in place; along with the courts, which would need to be refinished, it would have restrooms and storage areas. So far, Kamrath said, discussions that he and Corbin have had with the city have not turned up any major speedbumps.

Questions included what the center would cost. As noted in the FAQ sheet made available, it’s estimated to be around $4 million. It’s expected that would come “from multiple public and private sources” (though NOT school-district funds). And it would be self-sustaining once operational, bringing in money from lessons, court fees, and league play. It would likely be managed by a concessionaire, much the same way that Premier manages city golf courses. Too soon to say how all this would balance out with school use. And if you are recalling that the site was mentioned as a potential future elementary school, the FAQ says the district has told the group they don’t envision school construction on the site “for at least the next 28 years.”

(Read the full FAQ here.)

Watch here for word of the next community meeting and other updates.

Oakley34 June 9, 2016 (7:56 am)

Keep public funding out of this project.

WSEA June 9, 2016 (8:44 am)

I disagree. Its a public facility and it would actually make money over time. I would interested in know the timeline for the debt to be paid-off and the breakeven point but on the surface it looks like a good deal for the city.
- Oakley34 June 9, 2016 (9:43 am)
  
  Becoming self sustaining is not the same as make money over time. I think there are several other’needs’ types things that should be taken care of over an indoor recreation center that doesn’t serve all. Roads, for one. I’m all for spending public money for things the city desperately needs to address, but all these other drops in the bucket really add up, and contribute to tax fatigue among voters when it comes time to pony up for things that are of greater import.
  - quiz June 10, 2016 (12:26 pm)
    
    @Oakley34 – The other needs you’re referencing would be paid for out of completely separate city budgets. This is a facility that would enrich West Seattle. And If the money isn’t spent on this project it would likely just be spent on a similar one in another part of the city, not diverted to roads and such.

Colby June 9, 2016 (9:13 am)

Holy smokes I had no idea Amy Yee Tennis Center (the facility in Rainier Valley) was so expensive (http://www.seattle.gov/parks/reservations/feesandcharges/tennisrental.htm#indoor) for indoor tennis.

I was looking forward to this new facility to play during the fall/winter but I guess I will continue to play racquetball at the Tukwila Community Center ($7/hr) if the $32/hr holds true (stated in the FAQ).

JanS June 9, 2016 (11:45 am)

well, I supposed that if you were playing doubles, the cost could be split…but…yes, that’s damned expensive . What do I know? I’m retired(semi) and disabled. I would never use the facility.

Rick June 9, 2016 (9:35 am)

Why not take care of things almost everyone uses (roads,transit,etc.) first instead obtaining the new things a few will use at the expense of all? I know this is the Seattle way but it’s getting rather snobbish.

Rod Clark June 9, 2016 (12:45 pm)

The schools are overcrowded, population is growing like mushrooms, and we will need that land to build on, a lot sooner than 28 years. Some yahoo at the school district assured you of exactly the reverse? Great. I’m sure they say 23 believable things before breakfast every day.

Please make a realistic proposal to the Parks Department, to use Parks Dept. land instead, even if the cost with Parks is likely to be higher than you could waggle out of the school district.

M June 9, 2016 (7:23 pm)

This city and this community need those covered courts. I’m all for it. We have dozens of pools, several golf courses, many libraries, and countless miles of bike lanes. There are a lot of young people, families, and adults that want and could benefit from being able to year round

Rod Clark June 9, 2016 (9:33 pm)

Tennis courts are fine, and people do expect to find some as part of a parks and recreation department. I played on some free bare-bones outdoor courts in Renton as a kid, and enjoyed it. Even an expensive facility like this could be built somewhere in the area.

But a big facility like this shouldn’t be allowed to rip away a chunk of what little remaining buildable land we have for our pressing school expansion needs.

Find some suitable non-school land in a nearby area. The first and most obvious place would be the Steve Cox Memorial Park tennis courts in White Center. It already has many outdoor tennis courts, and a lot of other space along with some existing buildings. If you could cover some of the outdoor courts there, you might have a plan that a lot of people could support.

I will not support a cynical school-land grab like this, at the expense of school building space that we will soon need for everyone’s kids and grandchildren, just because you know all too well that the school district has been maneuvered into being a patsy for sales and leases of its land so many times in the past that it is obviously much the easiest target.

The City of Seattle’s approval of your project doesn’t mean much unless you win a vote of the School Board. As such, you needed to make, and you have made, serious School Board lobbying efforts, even though you don’t mention that in your fun facts. But after the recent School Board elections, I believe it has become less likely that the current School Board will approve a giveaway of part of the Denny site. You might want to do a quiet reality check on that, as things have changed a bit.

It’s time for you to revise your otherwise fine tennis center plans, to target a site that does not come at the cost of diminishing our scarce school land, and so to reach for a more positive goal for your project.

WSB June 9, 2016 (9:43 pm)

This isn’t a comment in support of (or opposition to) the project but as a datapoint, school land isn’t so scarce around here in the big-picture view. As of this fall, Schmitz Park will be entirely vacant, and the district doesn’t seem to have a plan for what to do with it next. Assuming Roxhill really is moved into EC Hughes in a few years, Roxhill will be vacant, with no plans yet voiced for its future. As of this fall, the Boren Building will be occupied by 300 fewer students, with Arbor Heights moving to its new site. And Arbor Heights itself will not be filling the school – unlike Schmitz Park, it wasn’t bursting at the seams. Lots of things to argue over on this project, like most, but WS is not currently short on school land if you look at the big picture. (And though it’s not SPS, there’s also the matter of whether that charter school really will take over 35th/Roxbury after all … if it falls through, that site might look appealing, albeit costly.) – Tracy

Rod Clark June 10, 2016 (12:46 am)

Tracy,

Thanks for bringing your rational viewpoint to this. But consider the impact of the new mandate to reduce class sizes in grades K-3, as a separate problem from the current overcrowding in many schools. Without the K-3 mandate, at the end of the current BEX building cycle the number of kids in portables likely would have been about the same as it’s been for the past few years. With the new non-negotiable requirement to add K-3 classrooms, even more portables will be needed, and the portable farms will grow larger. This mandate happened only recently, and it adds a serious space planning problem. To be fair, I will say that this happened after the tennis center plan was first drafted.

Even leaving aside K-3 expansion, we don’t actually have plenty of space now, unless you want to permanently accept that many schools have lost their art and music spaces, and have had to press into use other spaces not intended as classrooms, just to cram all the kids into something that can be called a class space. At some schools there aren’t enough bathrooms, and there are three shifts for lunch, cutting kids’ time to eat too short, and reducing recess. To make a real improvement in these conditions, right now, today, we would need more classrooms in more buldings than we have at present.

To alleviate the bathrooms/portables/lunchrooms/recess crunch, recover non-classroom spaces, and meet the new K-3 requirements, right now we could more than fill up not only the old Schmitz Park’s 217 or so non-portable seats, Hughes’ 300 or so non-portable seats and Roxhill’s 300 or so non-portable seats. All three of those small buldings put together would total only around 800 more seats, enough to relieve us of maybe 30 or so portable/art/music/non-classroom spaces, at around 26-27 kids per class. For comparison, even just a single school, Schmitz Park, this year has (I think) 20 portables.

Boren’s space is likely to be filled within a few years, and regardless we should be looking at a longer term planning horizon of more than a few years or one BEX cycle. Let’s say the district permanently lifts Boren’s enrollment cap. It’s then likely to grow as its middle school expands to grade 8 and becomes more of a real middle school that can take some of the space pressure off chock-full Denny.

The school district actually is short of classroom space, if you measure that by what normal, uncrowded classrooms should look like. It will get worse before its gets better. For the next generation, our choices today do matter. And I’m not at all sure that most parents would agree with you that we have so much extra room to grow now that we can afford to give up more of it.

Michael June 10, 2016 (3:09 pm)

I literally live two houses down and this is not a public facility or community center. Its a “Teen Life Center” or so i’ve been told by many people working there while trying to play basketball. I think they are afraid of liability lawsuits, having adults and kids in the same area, I’m not sure. All I know is that myself and 3 other respectful adults in basketball clothes were asked to leave the basketball court. I asked why and they said I wasn’t “13-19.”

As I said I live right next to it and its usually empty but even if they build a tennis court, I’m sure it will be the same and they wont allow people to use it. Unless they rent time, which wont be worth it.

WSB June 10, 2016 (3:13 pm)

Michael, yes, it is a public facility, owned by the city … The building east of the current tennis courts is Seattle Parks-owned Southwest Teen Life Center and Southwest Pool, with the Department of Neighborhoods taking up some space for the Neighborhood Service Center. I don’t know the SWTLC rules nor whether the courts are open to non-teens at any particular time, but please call the Parks Department’s main customer-service hotline if you think you were improperly kicked out.

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