Join us on Sat, Jun 11th at 5-8pm for our Annual Shipe Pool Party! After the sun goes down, we will show a family-friendly movie in the field so bring your blankets and lawn chairs. We will be celebrating summertime and the reopening of our beloved neighborhood pool! Free for one and all!

Special thanks to our event sponsors:

Astound Broadband (formerly Grande Communications) for hosting our movie and toy raffle!!

Hyde Park Neighborhood Association

Quack’s 43rd Street Bakery

Sat, Mar 5, 2022, 10am – 1pm

It’s been three years since Shipe Park has seen its regular slate of events. We have missed the pool-opening party and movies at the park, but most of all, we have missed seeing our neighbors. While we are still under the shadow of COVID, the Friends of Shipe Park thinks it’s important to greet one another after a long hiatus and show some love to the park. It has served as a safe place and refuge to many of us during the pandemic, and we celebrate the hope that we can spend more time together there and at other HPNA gatherings.  

With that in mind, we are planning to host It’s My Park Day at Shipe Park on Saturday, March 5, from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Sign up is open at https://austinparks.givepulse.com/event/270257-Refreshing-Shipe-Park

It’s My Park Day (IMPD) is a citywide event organized by the Austin Parks Foundation to galvanize volunteers to improve our neighborhood parks. Friends of Shipe Park sponsors the IMPD activities at the park, and we always have a robust turnout for the work done there. IMPD is a wonderful community event that will help the park while you get to know your neighbors. Nothing like digging in the dirt, weeding and aerating around your favorite old tree next to a whole bunch of friendly folks with common interests. Come join us!

As in years past, we’ll have similar grounds keeping goals:

• Mulching trees
• Spreading compost
• Cleanup of the landscape and beds around the pool

We ask volunteers to bring garden tools if they have them (and make sure to label them with your name, so they make it home with you at the end!). The kind of things we can always use:

• Work gloves
• Wheelbarrow (we always need more of these then we have)
• Garden forks
• Shovels
• Pitchfork
• Water bottle
• Wheelbarrow (yes, I listed it twice — we really do need them!)

It’s going to be a fun few hours of hard work and good times together! There will be snacks provided by Quack’s, along with music provided by the Griffin School House Band. Please wear work clothes and long sleeves.

Special thanks to all of the city-wide event sponsors, and the wonderful folks who are providing special support to our event this year:

Quack’s 43rd Street Bakery

Hyde Park Neighborhood Association

Austin Parks Foundation

Wheatsville Co-op

Friends of Shipe Park

On a hot, sunny afternoon, Shipe Pool is full of kids, families, and neighbors with smiling faces, enjoying the chance to splash around in the cool waters of our beloved neighborhood pool! After three years when our neighborhood pool was closed with damage and under construction (and then a limited opening last year under Covid restrictions), neighbors are delighted that Shipe Pool is open again this summer season!

Next to the appreciation for the pool, many swimmers are disappointed in the limited schedule for public swim days and times. The pool is open to the public on three weekdays (Mon, Tue, and Thu) 9am-4pm which conflicts with the work schedule of many people in 9-5 type jobs. On those days Shipe is open in the late afternoons/evenings only for swim lessons and swim team practices. It’s also open to the general public on Saturdays noon-7pm, but some neighbors feel that the current schedule has a bias against adults who work traditional hours.

Although we don’t have all the answers to these concerns, we do have some context for the situation with pools this summer. Most Austin neighborhood pools are still not open due to a severe shortage of lifeguards and because of widespread damage to pipes and pumps in the aquatics systems that happened in February’s severe winter storm. The Aquatics Department designed a gradual re-opening of pools, starting first with the year-round pools like Big Stacy, Bartholomew, and Deep Eddy since that is where most of the lifeguard training takes place. The next priority was Shipe and Govalle pools because we were without a pool for three years. 

In the choices made around pool reopening, Austin Aquatics leadership focused on equity between neighborhoods across the city. As much as possible, the city has made sure that each region of the city has equal access to neighborhood swimming pools. In a city where the history of our common resources has benefited the affluent, largely white neighborhoods, centering equity in decisions about the allocation of aquatics resources is an important goal. There remain areas of town that have no access to public swimming pools.

As more lifeguards are brought online, more pools will be opened across the community. Austin Aquatics leadership has shared that once other pools are open, it is possible that the schedule at Shipe Pool could be increased to include more days and/or hours. In addition, Aquatics may consider moving swim lessons and team practices to other pools so the public swim hours at Shipe can be expanded to include after-work hours.

We will hope for more pool access for all people across the city as the summer unfolds. In the meantime, let’s enjoy the beautiful pool we have at Shipe Park for as much time as it is available. For folks eager for a dip when Shipe Pool is not available, you can look into other public pools on the city’s website here: www.austintexas.gov/page/pools-splash-pads

Happy Summertime from the Friends of Shipe Park!

Submitted by Adam Wilson and Jill Nokes

Shipe Pool will open for its Summer 2021 season on Saturday, June 5, 2021! Shipe Pool will be open to the public on Saturdays from noon-7pm and Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays 9am-4pm. Shipe will also host swim lessons and swim team practices on various afternoons during the week – the pool is closed to the public during these times. See the Shipe Pool Summer 2021 schedule here.

The City of Austin Aquatics is opening a very few neighborhood pools in each section of town with many pools remaining closed because of lifeguard shortages. (See details of pool reopening plans here.)

City of Austin Aquatics announced that Shipe Pool will open on Monday, June 1, 2020.

See the Summer 2020 Shipe Pool hours and guidelines here.

Be safe and responsible. Happy summertime!

The old Shipe Pool filled and ready for the 2016 summer season.

City of Austin Parks and Recreation reported that further construction delays will result in the loss of the 2019 pool season at Shipe Pool. Interum PARD Director Liana Kallivoka shared the following Shipe Pool construction update with City Council on Aug 12, 2019:

Shipe Pool is tentatively scheduled for completion in September 2019, and at this time, the pool is not expected to open this season. The Aquatic team will consider opening the pool earlier for the 2020 swim season, contingent upon having adequate lifeguard staff available.

The full text of Dr. Kallivoka’s memo is here.

Friends of Shipe Park will continue to advocate for a successful completion of the pool construction project and the other related construction efforts:  the log cabin renovations, swing relocation, improvements in the area where the kiddie pool used to be, and a a restoration of the field and landscape all around the park. We’re all eager to see these projects done so we can benefit from the new infrastructure at Shipe and get this beloved space back.

Losing access to our neighborhood pool and park for this construction period has heightened our awareness of the great value of parks to our sense of community. We are looking forward to the gatherings of friends and neighbors we will have at Shipe Park again soon. From casual play dates with our young children to grand community parties – Shipe Park is where we feel like a genuine neighborhood.

We will share more soon as plans unfold for a Halloween movie night in the field, It’s My Park Day in the springtime, and the next Shipe Pool Party in 2020!

First the bad news: on June 13th representatives of the City informed the Friends of Shipe Park that Shipe Pool’s projected opening date has been delay once again. The opening date is now projected to be mid-August (a month later than the last projection.) The reasons given for this latest delay are 1) the late delivery of the glazed tile to be used in the interior of the bathhouse, 2) the plaster for the pool’s surface is a new longer-lasting material, but it will take longer to cure (dry); and 3) contractor delays (some weather related and some that, after a good start, the contractor’s work has slowed down considerably.) The substantial completion date is now July 30th . “Substantial completion” must be reached before the work can pass inspection and allow the City of Austin Aquatic Division to prepare for the use of the new pool facility including on-site life guard training, other safety procedures, and fine tuning of the facilities.

Now the good news: assuming no further delays, the Shipe Pool swim season will be extended, running from mid-August through September 28th. Weekday hours are currently scheduled for 4-8 p.m. and weekends from noon to 7:00 p.m. [Note: thanks to Council Member Kathie Tovo for working with PARD to arrange these extended swim days.]

After a few starts and stops due to weather and accessibility, the pool construction and renovation of the beloved Shipe Log Cabin is well underway! Phase 1 which included removal of the chinking and installation of new decking, zinc flashing and traditional shake shingles is nearing completion. Phase 2 will include new chinking, perimeter drainage work, new lighting, cleaning of the logs and application of a natural sealant to protect the wood from future deterioration. The materials for the reconstruction of the cabin will be in keeping with the original structure as much as possible. Material selections were vetted and selected by a team from the city spearheaded by Kim McNight, the Historic Preservation and Conservation Program Manager for PARD. As with all new construction, even those using “period” techniques and materials, it will take some time for the new wood and metal to acquire that “aged” look but we are confident it will patina nicely.

Many thanks to James Nolan Construction and PARD Project Managers George Maldonado and Mike Jones for keeping the project rolling.  A tip of the hat to the pool builders G Hyatt Construction Company for working with Friends of Shipe Park during their “big dig.” Most of all, Friends of Shipe Park wants to express our deep gratitude to the generous community members like you who have contributed so much towards restoring the Log Cabin to it’s rightful role as the “gathering place of Hyde Park.” This and other park improvements couldn’t happen without YOU!