After a year of construction and $6.4 million in renovations, the new Arlington Heights Park District Camelot Park Community Center will reopen on Saturday, October 11, 2014.
The new Camelot Park Community Center building is 18,522-square-foot located at 1005 E. Suffield Drive. The park district community center includes a new, larger gymnasium with an elevated walking track, offices, updated fitness equipment and rooms for preschool and other activities, said Anita Pacheco, superintendent of marketing and communications.
Camelot is now the second Arlington Heights Park District building to undergo a complete renovation, following Pioneer Park’s renovation in 2007.
The center also has three new lighted tennis courts, an updated parking lot, a sand volleyball court, a basketball court in the new gymnasium, a baseball field and hundreds of new trees, shrubs and flowers.
The renovations, which added more than 8,000 square feet of additional space, were partially paid for with a $2.5 million Illinois Department of Natural Resources grant, Pacheco said. The rest of the money came from the park district’s capital projects budget.
The community center closed in October 2013 for construction, but the process also included a year of community involvement with meetings and surveys from neighbors to help design the new center.
“Residents have been asking for this for a long time,” Pacheco said.
The old Camelot gymnasium is still part of the old building, but has been renovated and will be used for fitness classes.
“It honors the old and heralds in the new,” Pacheco said.
Energy efficiency was also a top priority when building the new Camelot Community Center, officials said.
All new exterior light fixtures and most of the interior light fixtures are LED lamps to reduce energy consumption and maintenance costs, according to the park district. All rooms have occupancy sensors to turn off lights when they are empty and lights in the main gym will turn off during hours of peak sunlight.
During the grand reopening celebration of Camelot Community Center, the Arlington Heights Park District is hosting a Camelot Faire from 10 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. on Saturday with jugglers, balloon art and a special appearance by two knights and a princess from Medieval Times Dinner and Tournaments in Schaumburg. Guests can participate in a knight’s training and sword fight demonstration by the Medieval Times members.
Sweet T’s Bakery and Cake Studio will host cupcake decorating at the event, also.
There will also be tours of the new building and demonstrations on the new fitness equipment.
The rest of the parks were scheduled to be updated as well, but voters rejected a tax increase twice in the past few years.
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