Slow-pitch tourney puts fixes on fast track at Diamond Lakes

AUGUSTA, Ga. (WRDW/WAGT) – There’s some major progress to report on the beleaguered restrooms at Diamond Lakes Regional Park – a new date for completion and an event for the grand reopening.

In late September, the USSSA Military Worlds softball tournament will be coming to south Augusta.

With a projected economic impact of $3.3 million, it’s expected to bring 2,500 people to Diamond Lakes and Fort Gordon – and all of them will need a place to make a pit stop.

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Diamond Lakes has been served only by some smelly portable outhouses while the problematic restrooms have been closed, but that’s about to change.

The city of Augusta pledged $850,000 to fix up the restrooms at Diamond Lakes in time for the summer season. That was after the city had spent $900,000 since 2018 trying to fix issues that date back to 2012.

Problems included pipes that had somehow gotten filled with objects and substances that weren’t supposed to be there. Some of it was suspected to have been epoxy that came from work that had been done before.

Ron Lampkin with Augusta/Richmond County Central Services says crews have had to replace all the piping to the restrooms and other facilities in the building with a towerlike structure.

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• Craig Allison is working to find out more about the restroom repairs at Diamond Lakes and the economic impact of the softball tournament, Watch for updates al day on WRDW.com and News 12.

Lampkin says the project was pushed over budget due to vandalism after people broke out windows inside the upper part of the building and flooded the inside with hydrant water.

In coming weeks – even in the next few days – crews are expected to lay in the utility lines for the toilets, which were missing from the walls this past weekend, and tile the vanity.

Not only can we expect excitement with sporting events coming to south Augusta, but the concession stands at the park will also open back up for the first time in years.

It’s not the first time Augusta has hosted the tournament.

It was held here in 2016 and 2017, but it stopped coming to south Augusta due to repairs at Diamond Lakes, as well as the pandemic.

So far, about 100 teams have registered for tournament that will take place from Sept. 27 to Oct. 1.

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