Maple Valley holds Beach House Bash

The city of Maple Valley had a groundbreaking celebration on Friday, March 16 for the new beach house at Lake Wilderness Park.

Construction to the beach house was funded by the overall budget that was approved by the Maple Valley Council back in June 2017, according to the Parks and Recreation Director Dave Johnson.

Out of the $10.7 million budget, about $1.73 million will go toward improvements for the beach house, he said.

On top of the $1.73 million, there is 10 percent contingency, Johnson said.

“Contingency is added to project cost and allows, there might be change orders or if there’s some unforeseen things that come up related to the project, it’s kind of a safety factor. Ten percent is a typical percentage for a project like this,” he said.

There is a 90-day working contract with the hired contractor Castle and Associates.

“The estimated timeline for full completion of the project, I believe, is July 20, somewhere right around there,” Johnson said.

The building will have the same features for the most part. But since it was built in 1973, Johnson said it was in need of a major remodel.

“The new building will feature the lifeguard station for our beach lifeguard program. It will have service access for the boat rentals that we do during the summer. It will have an expanded concessions area. It will have a drinking fountain that will have a bottle fill station to it,” Johnson said.

Women who attended the groundbreaking on Friday expressed excitement toward the improvements for the women’s restroom — they cheered and clapped when it was announced the city was increasing the number of stalls.

“The men’s restroom will have four stalls, which the current one also has four and the women’s restroom will have six stalls, which the current one only has four,” Johnson said. “So we’ll be increasing the capacity in the women’s restroom, which is strongly needed during the summer and especially during some of our special events.”

During the time of construction, which according to Johnson may be as early as next Monday, there will be temporary occupation of the beach house allowed during the Fourth of July event that is hosted every year at Lake Wilderness.

This will allow the public access to the restrooms and will allow the staff to have power in the building.

Other than the Fourth of July event, no one will be allowed access to the building, but the rest of the park will be open.

“There will be construction fence that surrounds the work area surrounding the current beach house while they do the demo and construction of the new building,” Johnson said.

During other special events, such as the fishing derby and Maple Valley Days, Johnson said there will be an impact.

“We’ll be working with the fishing derby folks and the Maple Valley Days folks to sort of help them plan around the construction,” Johnson said. “It’s (also) going to have a little bit of an impact on our summer beach program, so we’ll be bringing in some temporary trailer-type unit for our beach concessions and lifeguards until the new beach house is fully ready.”

Timing is the biggest issue, Johnson said. He said he and the rest of the people involved with planning of the beach house wish they could have started construction earlier to avoid construction during the busiest months at Lake Wilderness.

To make the construction area look a little more appealing, the city of Maple Valley has partnered with the Public Arts Commission and some of the Tahoma schools to create a banner that will be put on the construction fence.

The idea of the art project is for kids to depict what they think is “Lake Wilderness Beach Fun,” Johnson said.

“So it will depict their rendition of what ‘beach fun’ is like at Lake Wilderness, so we’re excited to have those up not only as an art project for the local kids, but a little bit of a banner if you will, shielding some of the construction site,” he said.