Astoria Pool Closure Prompts Delay Fears, Parks Assures 2024 Opening

ASTORIA, QUEENS — After one public pool in Queens took three years to reopen after the pandemic disrupted services, Astoria residents fear the same fate will fall upon its pool after it closes for the summer this season.

Astoria Pool will close until the summer of 2024, the city's Parks department announced last month, propelling fears that the reopening could be delayed further after the pool at Flushing Meadows Corona Park stretched its restoration amid supply chain woes.

"We're at a different place right now, and we are aiming for that one-year closure," said Meira Berkower, chief of staff for Queens at the city's Department of Parks & Recreation.

Berkower spoke at a meeting hosted by the Old Astoria Neighborhood Association on Wednesday evening, joined by Steven Moltz, the department's deputy director of engineering.

"We started off this project with the contractors before we even brought them on board, explaining how important this pool was to the community," Moltz said. "We intend to hold them to a very tight timeline."

Parks announced in February the $19 million restoration project at the pool located at 19th Street and 23rd Drive would include the reconstruction of the pool shell, gutter and deck replacements, installations of filtration, backwash, chemical treatment, and other repairs.

Astoria residents laid out several questions for the Parks representative on Wednesday's meeting, asking for clarification on the pool reopening's timeline, which started in October, and other issues.

"We have had a mild winter and we have been able to do concrete work that we normally would not anticipate being able to do during the winter," Moltz said.

The repair delays at the Flushing Meadows Aquatics Center stretched until February amid specialized materials that were not widely available during the period supply chain disruptions were wreaking havoc across all industries after the pandemic.

Residents in Astoria were also concerned that the pool closure will reduce the activities available to children and teenagers in the neighborhood.

Deputy inspector of the NYPD 114th Precinct, Kenneth Gorman, said that the Boys & Girls Club in Astoria has offered space for activities programmed by the neighborhood's precinct.

Gorman said that the precinct is also trying to build partnerships with houses of worship and schools to host youth-related programs at auditoriums or gyms.

Here's what the upgrades would look like: