It's a money pit, I know, most pools are, and the older they are the more problems they have, the Crystal has an old system and in the end they will end up wasting more money putting off replacing the pool, if they got it over with they would save money in the long run. There are more problems with the facilities too, because it was built so long ago there are no family changerooms and families change in our first aid room, workout machines are thrown into every nook and cranny because there is no dedicated workout room large enough to house it all.
But I think the biggest misconception about the Crystal pool is that if it was shut down we'd be ok because the city is being well enough served by Oak Bay and Saanich Facilities. We have national athletes that train at Crystal who would be without a home to train if the Crystal was shut down or replace by a mere 25 meter leisure pool.
If you come by early in the morning you'll find a gold medalist and half of the national triathalon team training in our waters, why do they choose the Crystal over Commonwealth, well, it's partly because there isn't enough pool space there to go around. If you come by in the afternoon as soon as school lets out you'll see we are overtaken by the Tyee swimteam, thier biggest wish, that we had more pool space to give them because they want to train more students. And when the national swimmers can't get pool time at Commonwealth, you'll find them in our waters. Oh, and you'll also find the Oak Bay Swim team in our waters two nights a week. When I asked why they don't swim at Oak Bay I was told it was because they couldn't get time there.
If we lost the Crystal, or didn't replace it with a 50 meter pool we'd be shutting out national athletes and prohibiting the development of future champs.
It is a funky old building, but I think there is more than one leak.
It would be great to have a full service rec centre there like other munis have, not just an aging pool.
But I agree, Victoria does have more pressing issues.
And it is reasonably well served by private facilities (plus Oak Bay/Saanich facilities!).