For communities like that of the Community of Communes of Two Valleys (CC2V), life is not always a long, quiet river. The CC2V knows this well, having had to be patient for several large-scale projects postponed in recent years. This was indeed the case of the flagship file carried out in this mandate by the president Carvalho and its teams: the intercommunal swimming pool. “We thought that this project would be launched in 2024,” recalled Patrice Carvalho, during his wish ceremony on Thursday January 9. And it is true that a year earlier during the same ritual at the start of the year, he had hoped for the first sod for the month of May. We’re not there yet. But almost.
A large pool with five lanes, a learning pool, a diving pit…
Evoking a “journey strewn with pitfalls” (difficulties in the choice of land, pandemic, etc.) the president obviously regretted the prices of entrepreneurs which have exploded in the meantime: “We left with a budget of 6.7 million d ‘euros, at the end of the first call for tenders at the end of 2023 we were at 11 million’. However, the community has not given up on its project. After a year 2024 spent looking for how to “make savings without lowering our ambitions”, that is to say offering equipment without breaking the bank “to offer the possibility of learning to swim to all the children in the region” and therefore responding to the needs of “different age groups”, the CC2V has definitively decided on the contours of its swimming pool: a large pool ultimately comprising five lanes, a learning and games pool for the youngest, a diving pit of 3 .5 meters “for scuba diving enthusiasts” and a climbing wall “for diving enthusiasts”. The swimming pool will also have plenty of indoor and outdoor games.
Energy cost adjustments
To make this project possible, the CC2V ensured, explained the president, “that it was ecological”. The main operating cost of such equipment is the energy required to heat it. Les Deux Vallées does not want to leave any feathers behind: high-performance insulation, geothermal energy and photovoltaics were therefore added to the project this last year.
After a first site meeting this week, on January 7, the president ventured a date for launching the work: in February. For opening to the public in summer 2026 “unless there is a delay due to bad weather”. We cannot be too careful indeed.
The sub-prefect of the district Christian Guyard, invited to speak after Patrice Carvalho, wanted to reassure elected officials and residents of the area: “You were not the only ones to have surprises when opening the envelopes,” he said. -he assured about the sharply rising construction costs. Explaining the phenomenon by inflation and the war in Ukraine in particular, the representative of the State nevertheless welcomed the success of the Thurotte file. “We know how it happens when areas are deprived of swimming pools as is currently the case in Noyon,” he commented, recalling that drowning is the leading cause of accidental mortality among young people.
The name of the intercommunal swimming pool has also been revealed: it will be called Juillion. Former educator and head of the Thourotte diving club, he died at the beginning of 2022 in a terrible accident which saw the explosion of a compressed air tank at the Georges Bonichot swimming pool.
Launch of the activity zone before the end of the year?
Among the other announcements, President Carvalho also took stock of another issue which has also dragged on for too long: the activity area between Thourotte And Longueil-Annel. Intended to accommodate new businesses, the ZA “came up against major difficulties in acquiring land,” recalled the elected official. In the absence of agreement, it was necessary to expropriate. “What was supposed to be resolved in a few months led to long years of delay,” summarized the president. But this time, we are… almost there: “We are now owners of all the land”, however, as for the intercommunal swimming pool, the accumulated delays will require “updating certain aspects of the project and its development,” said Patrice Carvalho, who nevertheless hopes for the start of “the construction phase by the end of the year.”
