Robinson Park Rec Center to be Renovated Soon; Staff to Relocate

The City of Pasadena is proceeding with the Robinson Park Recreation Center Renovation Project, which will include a substantial rehabilitation of the existing approximately 19,000 sq. ft. recreation center.

Currently, the project architectural design team has completed the “construction documents” phase of the project and is moving forward with the “plan review” phase. These include fully developing the construction plans and specifications for future bidding of the building construction.

Park Supervisor Darrell Walker confirmed the bidding process is ongoing, and the staff may have to move out of the building before January 2017 when construction is expected to start.

“Robinson Park is closing down,” Walker said. “We’re getting Robinson Park remodeled. So we got to move out… We’re moving our programs over to the Jackie Robinson Community Center (JRC) right across the street.”

Lola Osborne, Northwest Manager at Pasadena City Hall, said construction could take anywhere from 12 to 14 months.

Osborne said they’re not actually tearing the building down but adding on to the existing building.

“We’re not building a new building,” Osborne said. “It hasn’t had a definitive improvement for a number of years. It’s a two-phase project and the first one has already been done. The second one was a more ambitious project where we were going to knock down the whole building and build it brand new, but there were funding issues later on that we weren’t able to do that.”

Part of the improvement plan are the installation of new restrooms in the building and storage facilities, additional space of about 3,500 feet, and extensive rehabilitation of the existing 7,400 square-foot gymnasium building.

The City gathered community input for the project design in six community meetings, seven drop-in meetings and thirteen Steering Committee meetings during February 2013 and August 2015. Up to now, public input may still be received by the Robinson Park Recreation Center Renovation Steering Committee.

Neither Osborne nor Walker would give a definite date that the recreation center at Robinson Park would close, but Walker said it they should be out by January when construction is expected to start.