"I must implore you to reconsider the design to be a 50-meter pool," Spencer Rodman told the Carlsbad City Council in September 2024, as reported by the San Diego Union-Tribune. Rodman coaches swimming and water polo at Carlsbad High School, which sits next door to the pool and is one of its biggest users. Several high school swimmers asked for a bigger pool too. The council approved the 33-meter design that same night.
That pool is now plastered and full of water at 3401 Monroe St. In its Oct. 8 update, the city said it would announce the official reopening date "in the coming weeks." Plenty of swimmers have been driving to Alga Norte since spring 2025. The pool is coming back at 33 meters because the block around Monroe Street set the limit, and Carlsbad already had a 56-meter pool across town.
Nine lanes became fifteen
Here's the change in numbers. The old Monroe pool, built in 1982, was 25 meters long. The new one is 33 meters. City officials describe the overall design as 50 percent larger than the old pool, and it has 15 swim lanes where the old one had nine.
Lane count matters more than length for most people who swim there. Six extra lanes means more room during lap swim, lessons and team practice. A longer pool alone wouldn't add that capacity.
| Old Monroe Street Pool | Rebuilt Monroe Street Pool | Alga Norte Aquatic Center | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Opened | 1982 | Reopening date pending | 2014 |
| Main pool length | 25 meters | 33 meters | 56 meters |
| Swim lanes | 9 | 15 | Competition pool plus a 12-lane, 25-yard instruction pool |
| Location | 3401 Monroe St. | 3401 Monroe St. | 6565 Alicante Road |
The table shows the decision the council made. Carlsbad's only other city aquatics center, Alga Norte in Alga Norte Community Park, opened in 2014 with a 56-meter competition pool and a 25-yard, 12-lane instruction pool. The city already has a long-course pool. What it was short on was lane space near the high school.
What a 50-meter pool would have cost the block
At that 2024 meeting, Parks and Recreation Director Kyle Lancaster said that "in theory" the pool could be bigger. Then he listed what a bigger pool would cost, according to the Union-Tribune's account:
- Parking. A larger pool would take up room planned for parking.
- Solar. It would also take room from the solar panels.
- Neighbors. It would add to the noise and evening light reaching nearby homes.
- Time. More design work would delay the project by at least a year.
- Construction cost. A bigger pool would cost more to build.
- Operating budget. Running the 33-meter pool was already expected to cost about $370,000 more per year, and a bigger pool would raise that figure.
"We believe this is the right size approach," Lancaster said. "Larger would have a much more significant impact on the environment." Mayor Keith Blackburn said the project had been planned since at least 2015 and that he "could never face the community" if the council delayed it. "What we are getting is pretty darn good," he said.
Two of those reasons are about money and one is about the calendar. The other three are about what else had to fit on the lot and how the facility affects the homes next to it.
The block got its answers built in
You can see the same priorities in the city's project page. Many of the upgrades deal with the space around the water:
- An 8-foot wall with metal gates along Monroe Street to reduce noise for the surrounding neighborhood
- A larger parking lot and new entrances, including an outdoor entrance that bypasses the locker rooms
- A separate pool equipment room with its own service-vehicle access, so service trucks don't take parking spaces
- A new solar water heating system plus rooftop solar panels that generate electricity
- A bigger deck with lockers and outdoor showers, plus more shade and bleachers
- A redesigned lobby, family restrooms, and a room for meetings and small gatherings like birthday parties
Lancaster's list of trade-offs at that meeting maps closely onto this one. The sound wall answers the noise concern. The new lot and the service access deal with parking, and the rooftop arrays are the solar he said a larger pool would crowd out. With a 50-meter pool, some of these features would have been smaller or gone.
Voters approved the spending first
The size debate in 2024 came after an earlier vote. Under Proposition H, a Carlsbad law voters passed in 1982, certain projects that spend more than $1 million in general city funds need voter approval. That's the same year the original Monroe pool was built.
In 2020, the city put three options to the public: minimum repairs, modernizing the pool at its existing size, or expanding it by 50 percent. Most people who weighed in picked the expansion. Voters then approved Measure J in November 2022, which let the city spend up to $24 million, adjusted each year by the regional construction cost index. By 2024, that adjustment had pushed the cap to $25 million, and the latest estimate at the time was $23 million.
That helps explain why the size question was hard to reopen by 2024. Voters had approved a specific plan, the 50 percent expansion, with a spending cap, and that plan was what the council was approving. On Jan. 14, 2025, the council awarded a $14,126,653 construction contract to Edwards Construction Group, and the pool closed in March 2025.
Life during the closure
While Monroe was closed, the city kept swim programs and recreation going at Alga Norte, city Community Relations Manager Natalie Reed told The Coast News in January 2026. The city had renovated Alga Norte's locker rooms, restrooms and concrete before construction started, so one public pool would stay open the whole time.
The Carlsbad High water polo team felt the closure most. In November 2025, players told the student paper, The Lancer Link, that every "home" game had become an away game and fewer classmates came to watch. They also said they'd had less pool time. Rodman, the same coach who had argued for 50 meters, said the team had "gotten really good at utilizing the film, dry land workouts, and dry land walk-throughs." He also told the paper, "I choose to look at it as a positive instead of a negative as often as I can."
That's the clearest case for the 15 lanes. The school's teams needed water right next door, and the new pool has six more lanes of it.
What's left before the gates open
According to the city's Oct. 2 project update, the pool was plastered and filled, and the contractor was finishing these items:
- Testing water quality and pool equipment
- Installing the solar thermal panels that heat the pool
- Installing restroom fixtures
- Forming, paving and striping the larger parking lot
Two steps depend on other agencies. Gas work has to be scheduled with SDG&E, and the County Public Health Department has to give final approval. The city says some work may continue in limited areas after reopening but shouldn't affect public use. As of the Oct. 8 update, the city still planned to announce the reopening date "in the coming weeks." The city's facility directory page still says the pool is closed through summer 2026. That page hasn't caught up with the October updates.
The city hasn't published hours, fees or a program schedule for the new pool yet. To get the reopening date when it's announced, sign up for the city's Monroe Street Pool email updates. Until then, Alga Norte at 6565 Alicante Road is still the city's open pool.
If you're house-hunting and a pool close to home matters to you, Monroe and Alga Norte are on different sides of town and built for different kinds of swimming. Baris Yucelt can show you homes near either one, or both. Find Your Perfect Home.
