Kicking off a series of facilities upgrades totaling $15 million, the Oak Lawn Park District closed its ice arena last week for renovations.
The ice arena is scheduled to reopen in September, after the district replaces the ice surface, arena floor and the chiller as well as renovates locker rooms and adds perimeter netting.
The community pavilion at 9401 S. Oak Park Ave., and the Racquet, Fitness & Gymnastics Center at 10444 S. Central Ave. also face closures for construction, according to Oak Lawn Park District Executive Director Tom Hartwig.
Hartwig said the Park District last made large scale renovations in 2005, and replacing mechanics in the three facilities is necessary to avoid potential emergency closures.
“We’re trying to take a really big bite of the apple so that we are addressing possible concerns before they cause shutdown,” Hartwig said Monday. He said the chiller that keeps the ice frozen on the surface of the arena was past its useful life, and there are several other project underground to address.
He said an architectural assessment discovered priority systems replacements and two community surveys showed residents wanted surface level improvements.
“One of the top things that they wanted us to do was to take care of the infrastructure that we already had,” Hartwig said. “We have a lot of facilities. They are getting older, so there was definitely need for some of that.”
Hartwig said the Park District secured $15 million budget in alternate revenue bonds to cover the entire project, because the district settled all its long-term debt, including money borrowed to construct the facilities being updated.
The Park District aims to renovate six parking lots from April to this fall, starting with the lot at Stony Creek Golf Course and moving to the southern portion of the lot at the administrative building/central pool/ice arena, the lots at the Centennial Aquatic Center, the David Johnston Center and the community pavilion, and the northern portion of the ice arena lot.
Hartwig said the community pavilion, which serves as a sports facility housing more than 45,000 square feet of gym space, will get new flooring for its weight room in 2026. He said the building was constructed in 1987, so it’s also due for upgrades compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act as well as overall modernizations.
The first floor locker rooms and second floor restrooms will be prioritized for modernizations in the community pavilion. The community pavilion will be closed for four to six weeks, though the schedule is still being worked out, Hartwig said.
Hartwig said he hopes the Racquet, Fitness & Gymnastics Center will be closed for only a few weeks, also sometime in 2026, for mechanical unit replacements and lobby updates, including a new front desk.
Longer term, Hartwig said the Park District is working with an architecture firm to craft a parks master plan within the next few months that will detail spending priorities. He said he believes the parks are due for improvements, which will be easier to budget for once the infrastructure project wraps up.
Ed Worner, 81, returns the ball during his morning tennis match with friends at the Racquet, Fitness and Gymnastics Center in Oak Lawn. (Suzanne Tennant/Daily Southtown)
“A lot of the behind the scenes work — we’re doing that now because we know the price of fixing this is not going to go down,” Hartwig said. “We have the ability to bond for this much without raising taxes, without having to go to the voters and ask for money … So part of the reason was, let’s take that bite now while it’s cheaper.”
Hartwig said the Park District has felt the impact of rising costs for materials from inflation and he expects those costs to keep going up, making it more difficult to raise money for future capital projects.
The Oak Lawn Park Board meets at 7 p.m. on the second Monday of each month at the Oak View Center, 4625 West 110th St.
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