The Blue Gym floor will be replaced over the summer due to a water leak, per Director of Operations Jim Heynderickx.
Heynderickx said the freshwater pipes in the surrounding St. Johns Wood area have leaked, which caused the drains on Waverley Place to overflow with freshwater. He said the water was able to enter the Blue Gym through the wall and seep into the floor during the April break.
“During spring break, we saw the Blue Gym floor begin to have bubbling near the far wall,” he said. “That’s usually an indication that moisture was getting into the wood slats underneath the floor.”
Heynderickx said the floor quickly became unusable due to “warping and dead spots caused by moisture getting into the wood slats.” He said a different water leak five years ago caused the floor to be replaced. However, he said the prior leak was more gradual and created less damage.
PE Teacher Patrick Severijns said the warping of the floor posed a risk to students.
If you were playing any game with the ball bouncing, the floor absorbs the impact, and the ball just drops dead.
— Patrick Severijns, PE Teacher
“If you were playing any game with the ball bouncing, the floor absorbs the impact, and the ball just drops dead,” he said. “Plus, the warp was getting so bad that it became a trip hazard.”
Sage Saunders (’24) is currently enrolled in the Sports Leadership class, which requires students to teach Grade 3 and Grade 5 classes in different gym spaces. Saunders said although there were not large disruptions to classes in the Blue Gym, the bumps on the floor did draw attention.
“The bumps in the gym were not a safety concern as far as I could tell, but they were noticeable,” she said. “Sometimes the teacher had to make small announcements, and kids tended to gravitate towards the bumps.”
Heynderickx said to prevent water from seeping underneath the floor, they are removing the wood slat layer. The renovation process will involve roughening the old floor and then pouring a liquid layer of rubber crumble over it. Finally, he said a new, blue-color surface will be placed on top.
“There’s no place for water to get underneath or between the concrete anymore,” he said. “Even if water comes in again, it should go on top of that floor instead of underneath it because it will no longer have an air and wood slat layer.”
Heynderickx said although the floor is currently unusable, the renovation process will begin during the third week of summer and will take up to three weeks. He said the process will begin during the summer because the renovation “makes a lot of noise and kind of rattles the building.”
Severijns said the previous floor was very soft, enabling younger children to fall or slide on it without getting injured. However, he said the new floor will be harder, which will not prevent injuries to the same degree.
“Especially for younger kids, they could fall on their knees and slide on it without getting any burn marks,” he said. “It was a very easy to use floor to be active on. The new floor is going to be a little bit harder so a little bit less forgiving than the old floor.”
Severijns said an advantage of the new floor is that its blue color will prevent confusion around the name of the gym. He said given that the previous floor was made from simulated wood, it did not “make sense why everybody referred to it as the Blue Gym.”
In terms of the disruption that the lack of the Blue Gym has caused, Saunders said she has noticed that PE classes have “needed to be shifted to other spaces.” For example, after expecting to teach volleyball in the Blue Gym, she said classes had to adapt to teach it in the Farmer Gym.
I’ve noticed that classes tend to work together to figure out who occupies what space with groups that require equipment remaining inside, while other activities have become more flexible.
— Sage Saunders (’24)
When coping with this disruption, Saunders said different classes have collaborated to organize where each class will be held. She said classes requiring equipment often stay inside, while other classes have needed to take place outside.
“Our class is mostly affected by the other classes around us,” she said. “I’ve noticed that classes tend to work together to figure out who occupies what space with groups that require equipment remaining inside, while other activities have become more flexible.”
Severijns said not having current access to the Blue Gym has also led to more Middle and High school classes traveling to Regents Park, which has required additional scheduling and a broadening of the curriculum.
“It’s a little bit more planning and shuffling people around, which is not ideal,” he said. “Because we are making the learning a little bit bigger, we have more flexibility to move away and do something different.”
