Photo: Anne Paulsen, president of the pool’s building committee, at the nearly completed new Underwood Pool. 

All day Friday, July 31, an armada of approximately 25 tankers trucks will be traveling to Concord Avenue at Cottage Street to deliver the one missing component required to make the recently constructed New Underwood Pool a success: Water. Lots of it.

According to Anne Paulsen, chair of the Underwood Pool Building Committee, the town can’t simply turn on a few hoses and sprinklers to fill the two pools created over the former site of the original Underwood Pool which served the town for 101 years until 2013. 

“The pools need filtered water which the town can’t provide,” said Paulsen.

For residents who remember the ground breaking on a bitterly cold day in November 2014, the transformation of the site in the past nine months is fairly remarkable, said Paulsen.

“I think this has turned out to be a marvelous project,” said said, praising her fellow committee members, the architecture, contractors and general manager. 

With a little more that a week remaining before the doors are opened to the public, the location remains an active work site, with sheet metal being shaped and nail guns firing inside the three pool buildings – two bath houses and a pump station – as final details are completed.

Outside, the slide at the kiddy pool was being assembled, the final sidewalks are being laid and landscaping continues with the planting of sod and plantings.

But Paulsen said it’s almost certain that the pool will be operational at 9 a.m. on Monday, Aug 10,   “and not a minute before.” 

The Belmont Board of Selectmen will lead the official ribbon cutting at 1:30 p.m. on Saturday, Aug. 8, beginning with an open house from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. 

“I think the result is one that the town can really be happy with,” said Paulsen. 

“And it’s under budget and on time,” she added. 

Beginning Aug. 10, the pool will be open from 9 a.m. to dusk. Day passes can be purchased at the pool (cash or check), or in a three-pack from the Belmont Recreation Department office at a discounted rate. Pool memberships are $150 and will get holders into both the Underwood and the Higginbottom.

Call the Belmont Recreation Department at 617-993-2760 for more information about passes and memberships.