Missed Opportunities - Exhibits and Education Center Did Not Get a New Building Off-site of the Bathhouse

Post #8 in a series

The Bathhouse sits inside the Barton Creek floodplain. That fact alone shaped what the City's own 2016 feasibility study said should happen to the Exhibits and Education Center — and it didn't happen that way.

What the 2016 Feasibility Study Recommended

The study pointed out that Austin City Code (§25-7-96) limits new construction inside a floodplain to a narrow list of small structures — a restroom or bath facility, a concessions stand, a tool shed, or a pump house, each under 1,000 square feet. A real Visitor's Center, in other words, legally couldn't be built at the Bathhouse itself. It had to go somewhere above the flood hazard zone.

So the study recommended exactly that: a new, stand-alone Visitor's and Education Center of 6,000 to 8,000 square feet, located near the children's playscape parking lot, within 500 feet of the Bathhouse Rotunda. The recommendation combined the Visitor Center, the Sheffield Education Center, and the SPLASH! exhibit into this one new building — both to share infrastructure costs and to properly integrate education into the visitor experience of the park. The study's own 2016 budget estimate for that new building was $3.5–$5.5 million, on top of roughly $12 million estimated for the rest of the project (which didn't include a firm number yet for Rotunda and dressing-room rehabilitation).

What BSC Was Raising Money For

Barton Springs Conservancy's own 2016–2017 promotional fundraising video, “For the Love of the Springs,” showed this same concept: a stand-alone Visitor Education Center, entirely separate from the Bathhouse, with its own classroom/office/meeting-room wing and a “Splash and Theater Wing,” plus exhibits on energy, water conservation, weather, geology, and bird-viewing. The City's agreement with BSC for BSC's original $3,000,000 contribution to the project was reached in 2016 — the same year as this video.

What Got Built Instead

By October 2018, Limbacher's design concepts had already folded the education and exhibit functions into the Bathhouse's Rotunda rather than placing them in a new, off-site building — the same pivot away from the 2016 study's Sheffield Education Center relocation that Post #4 of this series asked the City about. The finished project — covered earlier in this series — shows extensive exhibit, audio-visual, and IT infrastructure built directly into the Rotunda, the adjoining exhibit hall, and the Sheffield Education Center, all inside the historic, floodplain-sited Bathhouse itself.

Questions for a journalist:

• When was the plan for a separate, off-site Visitor and Education Center dropped, and by whom?
• Given the floodplain construction limits the 2016 study cited, how was education and exhibit space ultimately permitted inside the Bathhouse rather than in the new off-site building the study said was needed?
• Did donors who gave toward BSC's 2016 agreement know their money might end up funding education and exhibit space inside the Bathhouse, rather than the stand-alone Visitor Center shown in BSC's own fundraising materials?

Sources

2016 Zilker Park Bathhouse Zone Feasibility Study (City of Austin Parks + Recreation Department / MWM DesignGroup), pages 40–41 and 54. Barton Springs Conservancy promotional video, “For the Love of the Springs” (vimeo.com/216682712).

Missed Opportunities - Women's Dressing Area Not Restored to Historic Design

Post #7 in a series

Source: The Parks Department reported, in the Community Engagement Summary, "What we heard": "congestion in the women's restroom."

In 2024, when the City broke ground on the Bathhouse rehab, I and about twenty fellow protesters showed up with signs reading “$14M to DESTROY the historic women's dressing area.”

The City's own 2016 feasibility study for this project suggests that we had a point.

What the 2016 Feasibility Study Recommended

The study laid out a four-phase plan for the Bathhouse. Phase 3 called for relocating the pool's Aquatics operations — offices, maintenance, and storage — into a new, consolidated facility, freeing up the “former women's basket area.” Phase 4 then built on that: with Aquatics out of the way, “the women's changing room could be restored to approximately its original size and configuration,” preserving the historic character of the space while addressing maintenance problems and better accommodating modern privacy needs.

The same section recommended restoring elements of the historic “basket room” configuration — tall open volumes with natural ventilation and clerestory daylighting — and suggested that a restored portion of the space could even host interpretive displays for pool visitors.

This wasn't a minor aside: at the City's own August 2018 community meeting, “congestion in the women's restroom” was one of only three things listed in the summary of what the City heard from the public.

What Got Built Instead

By October 2018, Limbacher's design concepts already showed staff functions intruding into the women's dressing area — not receding from it. And per the project's own occupant-load calculations (Sheet T1.02, dated April 26, 2023), the final built space is still lopsided: the Men's Shower/dressing area totals 4,101 square feet (occupant load 82), while the Women's Shower/dressing area totals 3,098 square feet (occupant load 62) — a gap of 1,003 square feet, and 20 fewer people the women's side is rated to hold.

That gap lines up with a finding from Post #4 of this series: the Aquatics facilities that the 2016 study wanted relocated out of the women's area don't appear to have moved at all — they're still carved out of the women's dressing area, in roughly the same footprint as before. If Aquatics never left, the space the 2016 study intended to free up for the women's changing room was never actually freed.

Questions for a journalist:

• Since Aquatics operations were not relocated as the 2016 study recommended, is that why the women's changing area could not be restored to its original size?
• Why is the women's dressing/shower area more than 1,000 square feet smaller than the men's in the final, built design?
• Did the City consider any alternative that would have restored the historic size and configuration of the women's changing room, as its own 2016 study recommended?

Sources

2016 Zilker Park Bathhouse Zone Feasibility Study (City of Austin Parks + Recreation Department / MWM DesignGroup), Recommendations section, pages 50–54; the women's-changing-room recommendation is also excerpted separately here. Sheet T1.02, “Design Data” / Occupant Loads table, 100% Construction Design Intent Document set, Limbacher & Godfrey Architects, April 26, 2023 — full sheet. Austin Parks and Recreation Department, Bathhouse Rehab Community Engagement Summary (final, Dec. 3, 2019) — full document.

Possible operational issues: Questions about the occupancy limits of the Rotunda, and air conditioning

Post #6 in a series

On a hot Austin summer day, shade temperatures can reach 104 degrees. Visitors queue outside, and as the line moves, they will eventually reach the Rotunda — the rehabilitated Bathhouse's new, air-conditioned entrance.

The architects' own construction documents suggest that keeping that queue orderly, and that air conditioning intact, may be harder than it sounds.

What the Plans Say

Sheet T1.02 of the 100% Construction Documents (Limbacher & Godfrey Architects, dated April 26, 2023) contains the project's Occupant Loads table — the code-required calculation of how many people each room is allowed to hold. For Room 4, the Rotunda, using the standard assembly-space factor of one person per 30 square feet, the table calculates an occupant load of 13 people for the Rotunda's 381 square feet. The adjoining Transaction and Passage areas are each calculated separately, at 1 person apiece. The Exhibits area has an occupant load of 25 people. Several of these people need to be CoA staff.

Occupant Loads table, Sheet T1.02, Zilker Metro Park Barton Springs Bathhouse Rehabilitation, April 26, 2023.

It is my understanding that the entire Rotunda is conditioned space with inoperable windows. In other words, there's no cracking a window for airflow — the Rotunda depends entirely on mechanical air conditioning, and its only connections to the outside air are its doors.

The Operational Question

That leaves the building's daily operation to reconcile a 13-person occupancy limit inside the Rotunda and 25-person occupancy of the Exhibits with a queue of visitors outside in well over 100-degree heat, every one of them eager to step into the air conditioning.

Questions for a journalist:

• How will the Rotunda's 13-person occupancy limit be maintained when visitors are eager to step inside to feel the air conditioning? Similarly for the Exhibit's 25-person occupancy limit?
• If the entry door is not closed between each visitor — and is instead propped open — how does the operational plan account for the resulting loss of air conditioning?
• Who is responsible for monitoring the number of visitors inside the Rotunda to ensure compliance with the stated occupancy limit?

Sources

Sheet T1.02, “Design Data” / Occupant Loads table, from the 100% Construction Design Intent Document set for the Zilker Metro Park Barton Springs Bathhouse Rehabilitation (Limbacher & Godfrey Architects, April 26, 2023; City contract CSP 6100 CLMB341 / CIP 6066.035). Source: CSP_6100_CLMB341_PLANS_v1.pdf; full sheet also available as “BSBH Cover page 2 Occupant loads.pdf”.

Two Concerns of Barton Springs Conservancy - Staffing and Storage

Post #5 in a series

Barton Springs Conservancy (BSC) — the nonprofit partner that helped raise private funding for the Bathhouse rehab and the new exhibits — has flagged two operational concerns to the City in emails obtained through public information requests: staffing to run the rehabilitated Bathhouse, and storage for the tools and equipment BSC's volunteers use to maintain the springs. Neither appears to have a clear, current public answer.

1. Staffing

In July 2025, BSC president Mike Cannatti wrote to PARD Assistant Director Lucas Massie, following up on what he called “a pressing matter now that we are in the budget season.”

(Above) Mike Cannatti (BSC) to Lucas Massie (PARD Assistant Director), July 19, 2025.

Cannatti's understanding was that PARD's own budget submission to the City Manager's office had included five new FTEs in each of the next three fiscal years (FY26–28): building and grounds assistants to operate, manage, and clean the rehabilitated bathhouse grounds, plus exhibit staff — cultural and arts education specialists, exhibit specialists — to staff and maintain the new education exhibits at the central rotunda. Roughly speaking, he estimated, this would cost just under $2 million, staggered over four years. Cannatti also wrote that BSC understood the City Manager's proposed budget had not included that requested staffing funding, and that BSC wanted to raise the gap with City Council during that summer's budget deliberations.

That was the summer of 2025. The current answer to the Bathhouse staffing needs should be found in the City's FY2027 budget.

Questions for a journalist:

• Has the CoA sufficiently budgeted for staff?
• How many additional staff positions are needed for the new Bathhouse rehab?

2. Storage

In March 2026, Cannatti raised a second, more concrete concern: where BSC's volunteers were supposed to store their own equipment.

(Above) BSC explains the lack of storage for volunteer equipment — Mike Cannatti to Ellen Colfax (PARD) and David Polkinghorn, March 24, 2026.

(Above) CoA's Ellen Colfax replies — March 25, 2026.

Colfax acknowledged the problem — volunteers' tools, wheelbarrows, and ladders had been stacking up in the emergency exit hall, which she confirmed isn't allowed — and said Aquatics staff would move the wheelbarrows to a fenced area behind the café. A permanent solution for the rest of the equipment, she wrote, was still being worked out.

Questions for a journalist:

• Has the CoA found a permanent storage location for BSC's volunteer equipment at or near the Bathhouse?
• After coordinating donations of over $3.5M for the Bathhouse rehab project, why did the designers neglect to create storage for the BSC's tools, wheelbarrows and ladders?

Sources

Emails obtained through City of Austin public information requests: the staffing thread (Cannatti to Massie, July 19, 2025, forwarded to Jesus Aguirre July 21, 2025) via PIR #249, and the storage thread (Cannatti to Colfax and Polkinghorn, March 24–25, 2026) via PIR #507: original message and Colfax's reply.

Questions: Has the current Limbacher design satisfied all objectives?

Post #4 in a series

The Scope of Services for the Joan Means Khabele Bathhouse rehab design contract (RFQS_6100_CLMP223) laid out seven objectives. Four of them are not immediately apparent to the public eye.

“Objectives of the Project,” City of Austin Scope of Services, RFQS_6100_CLMP223, Revision Date 10/01/15.

It would be helpful if City staff could explain each of the four boxed and highlighted objectives above, including answers to these questions:

• Life safety egress — Are there 25 linear feet of north-side egress in the event of an emergency?
• How was the location of the Exhibits and Education Center decided?
• Relocated and expanded Aquatics Facilities with storage for WPD salamander biologist equipment: have the storage needs of CoA staff been met?
• The new parking lot: please explain in terms of impervious cover requirements of the entire site.

1. Life Safety Egress

The Scope calls for “Life Safety Egress, ADA accessibility and automated entry improvements to the Bathhouse and related Barton Springs Pool perimeter.” The City's own 2016 Feasibility Study had already spelled out why this mattered, in fairly blunt terms: “At present, the number and location of emergency exits from the north side of the pool are conspicuously deficient with respect to the requirements of the Building Code… the north side of the pool should be provided per code with not less than four means of egress, with a total width of not less than 25'.” The same study noted that state pool regulations require every door, gate, and window in the pool enclosure to be either staffed or locked, which is why it recommended that egress points double as supervised entry points — and separately, that a required means of egress cannot be gender-segregated, nor located in an area that is.

Put together, that's a specific, checkable standard: at least four emergency exits from the north side of the pool, totaling 25 feet of width or more, each one supervised, and none of them split by gender.

Has the completed design met it?

2. The Sheffield Education Center and SPLASH! Exhibit Location

The Scope calls for the design team to “Determine Sheffield Education Center/SPLASH! Exhibit Location and related Remodel.” But the 2016 Feasibility Study's Recommendations section (covered in Post #2 of this series) didn't leave that question open — it concluded that relocating the Sheffield Education Center off-site was “the most viable means” of protecting its educational programs from the next flood, and that a relocated Center could be combined with a new Visitor's Center for the park. That's not what happened: the Education Center and the SPLASH! exhibit both remain inside the Bathhouse.

Who decided to keep them there, and why wasn't the 2016 study's recommendation followed?

3. Aquatics Facilities and WPD Storage

The Scope calls for “Relocated and expanded Aquatics Facilities with storage for WPD salamander biologist equipment within the Bathhouse.” Two things about that are worth checking.

First, the Aquatics space doesn't appear to have moved — it's still carved out of the women's dressing area, in roughly the same footprint as before. Why wasn't it relocated?

Second, the objective specifically promises storage space for the Watershed Protection Department's salamander biologists. Did WPD actually get that storage?

4. Parking Lot Reconfiguration and Site Improvements

The Scope calls for the design to coordinate with “Parking lot Reconfiguration and Site Improvements.”

Please explain the new parking lot in terms of the alterations in the ratio of pervious-to-impervious cover of the entire site, including the Bathhouse.

Sources

These questions are drawn directly from two City documents: the Scope of Services for the design contract (RFQS_6100_CLMP223, “Objectives of the Project,” Revision Date 10/01/15) and the 2016 Zilker Park Bathhouse Zone Feasibility Study (City of Austin Parks + Recreation Department / MWM DesignGroup), both obtained through public information requests. None of the four questions above has a public answer yet.

What the Visitor Encounters Entering the New Rotunda: An Inventory of the 2023 Electronics Program

Post #3 in a series

You've come to Barton Springs Pool, bathing suit and towel in hand. You enter through the restored historic Rotunda.

Below is a room-by-room inventory of the audio-visual and IT hardware built into the Rotunda, the adjoining exhibit hall, and the Beverly S. Sheffield Education Center — drawn directly from the exhibit designer's 2023 equipment schedule.

The known price tag for the exhibits — the equipment, design, fabrication, and installation — totaled at least $750,000, though the total cost is unknown.

• Barton Springs Conservancy — $384,000 (private philanthropic dollars)
• Watershed Protection Department (Salamander Fund) — $291,000 (public dollars)
• Water Department — $75,000 (public dollars)

Source Note

This inventory is drawn from a single sheet in the construction document set for the Zilker Metro Park Barton Springs Bathhouse Rehabilitation (City contract CSP 6100 CLMB341 / CIP 6066.035): sheet WF15.2, titled “Splash! Interpretive Experience — Audio Visual/Information Technology Inventory Draft,” prepared by the exhibit design firm FD2S Inc. (Austin, TX) and dated April 26, 2023, as part of the “100% Construction Design Intent Document” set. It is explicitly labeled a draft — a design-phase budget estimate, not a confirmed as-purchased invoice. Actual equipment and pricing may have changed by the time of installation.

Source: CSP_6100_CLMB341_PLANS_v1.pdf.

The three sections below follow the order a visitor moves through the building: into the Rotunda first, then the adjoining exhibit hall, then the Beverly S. Sheffield Education Center classroom space.

1. The Rotunda

Three installations, totaling $55,887 in listed hardware.

Bulkhead Projection Surface (AV-R3) — $37,156. A Christie D20HD-HS large-venue laser projector with a Christie 0.84–1.02:1 zoom lens, driven by a dedicated Windows 10 PC. It projects onto what the drawings call a “bulkhead” — a printed graphic wall surface with a designated live-video area built into it.

Digital Scrapbook (AV-R2) — $11,347. An Ideum 43″ inline touchscreen paired with a Windows 10 PC, plus a second, non-touch LG 43UH5F-H digital signage display run by a BrightSign LS424 media player, showing historical photographs and related content.

Video Docent Kiosk (AV-R1) — $7,384. An Ideum 43″ inline touch display with a commercial-grade (24/7-rated) Chromebox for playback, and a handset speaker visitors pick up to hear narrated audio — functioning like an audio-tour stop.

2. The Exhibit Space

Four installations. The individually itemized line items sum to $89,344; the sheet's own section header separately states the exhibit space's hardware total as $167,536. That roughly $78,000 difference isn't explained by anything legible on the sheet — it may reflect cost categories (cabling/infrastructure, engineering, installation labor, additional contingency) not broken out in the itemized rows, or a line item obscured in the drawing. Both figures are reported here as they appear in the source.

“Swim with the Salamanders” (AV-EX3) — $51,981. An 11-panel LG 49VL5G-M video wall (one panel held as a spare), run by three Datapath FX4 4K video-wall decoders and a high-spec Windows 10 PC, with a Microsoft Kinect Azure motion-tracking camera reading visitors' movement, two Crestron ceiling speakers, and a Crestron AMP-X300 amplifier.

“Watershed Model” (AV-EX2) — $26,711. An Epson Pro L1505UHNL large-venue laser projector onto a physical model, an Elo Touch E146266 open-frame touchscreen, a medium-spec Windows 10 PC, a Crestron NVX-360 video extender/receiver pair, and a handset speaker.

“Protection Lands” (AV-EX1) — $7,384. An Ideum 43″ inline touch display, a 24/7-rated commercial Chromebox for playback, and a handset speaker.

“Ceiling Scrim” (AV-EX4) — $3,268. A custom addressable RGB LED lighting installation, an Intel NUC mini-PC for playback, a Crestron pendant speaker, a Crestron AMP-X300 amplifier, and a Crestron relay.

3. The Beverly S. Sheffield Education Center

Two installations, totaling $22,303.

“Curricula-based Display” (AV-ED2) — $20,572. A 55″ Ideum inline touchscreen driven by a full Crestron control-room setup: an NVX-360 video switcher, a 7″ LCD control panel, an HDMI input panel, an AM3200 wireless video input, and a CP4 control processor, plus two ceiling speakers, an amplifier, and a low-spec Windows 10 PC. Relative to its size, this is the single most electronics-dense installation in the building.

“Salamander Aquarium” (AV-ED1) — $1,731. An Elo Touch E146266 23″ display, a BrightSign LS424 media player, and a handset speaker.

Totals

Space	Hardware total (as itemized)
Rotunda	$55,887
Exhibit Space	$89,344 (sheet header states $167,536 — see note above)
Sheffield Education Center	$22,303
Combined (itemized figures)	$167,534

Across all three spaces, the single most expensive individually-identifiable device is the $51,981 11-panel LG video wall in “Swim with the Salamanders” — the largest hardware commitment of any one exhibit in the building.

The Design Options Shown to the Public

Post #2 in a series

Below is a sequence of design images related to the Joan Means Khabele Bathhouse rehabilitation project, shown in chronological order.

1946 Plan

City of Austin, Barton Springs Bathhouse Rehabilitation Design Update presentation, October 30, 2019 (slide labeled “1946 PLAN”).

2016 Feasibility Study Recommendations

Source: Zilker Park Bathhouse Zone Feasibility Study, City of Austin Parks + Recreation Department, MWM DesignGroup, June 10, 2016.

1. Cover Page
“Zilker Park Bathhouse Zone Feasibility Study,” City of Austin Parks + Recreation Department, MWM DesignGroup, June 10, 2016.

2. Recommendation: Phase 1 – Life Safety and Access Improvements
From Section VII, Recommendations, 1. Bathhouse Rehabilitation, a) Phase 1: Life Safety and Access Improvements.

3. Recommendation: Phase 4 – Rehabilitation of Rotunda and Changing Areas
From Section VII, Recommendations, 1. Bathhouse Rehabilitation, d) Phase 4: Rehabilitation of Rotunda and Changing Areas.

4. Recommendation: Sheffield Education Center Improvements
From Section VII, Recommendations, 2. Sheffield Education Center Improvements.

5. Bathhouse Projects, Phase Four (site diagram)
Zilker Park Bathhouse Zone Feasibility Study, site diagram.

A Vision Plan Created by Barton Springs Conservancy, 2016–2017

A Conceptual Vision for a Visitor Education Center
Barton Springs Conservancy promotional video, “BSC – For the Love of the Springs” (One Story Productions), vimeo.com/216682712.

Visitor Education Center – Exhibit Detail
Barton Springs Conservancy promotional video, “BSC – For the Love of the Springs” (One Story Productions), vimeo.com/216682712.

Prior to Bathhouse Rehab: Existing Floor Plan

City of Austin, Barton Springs Bathhouse Rehabilitation Design Update presentation, October 30, 2019.

2019: Limbacher's Final Preferred Scheme

City of Austin, Barton Springs Bathhouse Rehabilitation Design Update presentation, October 30, 2019.

For Comparison: Limbacher's 2008 Proposal

The 2019 designs above came from architect Laurie Limbacher. Limbacher had also proposed a bathhouse design more than a decade earlier, shown to the public in 2008.

Limbacher’s proposed design in 2008
Barton Springs Pool Master Plan, 2008. See the annotated version.