Inground pools in Brunswick, Ohio

Brunswick grew fast. The city had about 11,700 people in 1960 and 35,426 at the 2020 census. On a typical subdivision lot, planning a pool usually means a regular, fairly flat rear yard with a neighbor on three sides, a utility easement somewhere along the back, and often a homeowners association. The city's pool guide asks for a letter of approval from your association if you belong to one, so we get that request in early, while the design is still on the screen.

Easements are the other early check. Brunswick's guide says plainly that pools may not be placed in any easement, and on many subdivision lots a drainage or utility easement eats the back 10 or 15 feet. We pull the plat before we draw anything.

Almost every point we sampled in the USDA soil survey across Brunswick came back as Mahoning or Ellsworth silt loam. Both formed in glacial till with a lot of clay, and water moves through them slowly. Mahoning is somewhat poorly drained. Ellsworth is a little better, but the USDA still puts a perched water table 11 to 24 inches down from November to May in most years.

In practice, a Brunswick excavation dug in April often has water in it by morning. We plan for pumping, set the shell on a proper base, and backfill in a way that lets water get away from the pool rather than pushing on it. The clay spoils make poor backfill and usually leave the site. Grading matters here too, and the city checks it: final grading is one of the required inspections, and the new topo map shows the engineering department how water will move across your lot once the pool is in.

Chapter 1472 of the Brunswick Codified Ordinances treats a pool as anything with 300 square feet of water surface or more than 24 inches deep at any point. For an inground pool, the rules that shape the design are these:

• Nothing in front of the building setback line.
• At least 10 feet from the house foundation.
• At least 10 feet from side and rear lot lines, and that includes walkways and decks, not just the water.
• The pool may not take up more than 10 percent of the total lot area.
• You must keep an unobstructed view of the pool from the house.
• No part of the pool more than 1 foot above natural grade.
• Backflow prevention on the fill, and pool water may never drain into the sanitary sewer. Draining to a storm sewer needs the city engineer's approval.

The 10 percent rule is easy to check. A quarter acre lot is about 10,900 square feet, so the water surface can be up to about 1,090 square feet, which is far more than a 16 by 40 Liberty shell. It is the deck setback that tends to bind. A 4 foot wrap deck means the water's edge has to be at least 14 feet from the lot line.

There is also a lighting rule. If your pool is within 200 feet of another home, pool lights go off by 11 p.m.

Section 1472.05 requires a rigid fence at least 4 feet and no more than 6 feet high, with members no more than 4 inches apart, no more than 3 inches of clearance at the bottom, and gates the same height as the fence that close and latch on their own and stay locked when nobody is swimming. The unusual part is location: the pool fence must be at least 6 feet from side and rear property lines and 10 feet from permanent buildings. So your existing lot line privacy fence usually can't double as the pool barrier here, and the space between the two fences needs a plan for mowing.

The city's pool guide adds the barrier rules from the International Swimming Pool and Spa Code, including a latch release on the pool side when the latch sits under 54 inches and a 36 inch clear zone outside the barrier. Some subdivisions are stricter still. Autumn Creek and Oak Ridge Preserve cap fences at 5 feet. Because the ordinance and the guide word a few details differently, we confirm the fence drawing with the Building Department before ordering materials.

Brunswick runs its own Building Department, and it issues the pool, fence and electrical permits. Two copies of the application go in with a site plan showing where the pool sits, plus the sealed topo map. Then come nine inspections: location, underground electrical, gas, bonding, deck pre-pour, electrical final, heater final, building and barrier final, and grading final. Pool wiring is checked against Article 680 of the 2023 National Electrical Code. That is a lot of stops, and each one needs the work open for the inspector, so our schedule is built around them.

Fiberglass is the usual choice here. A Liberty shell arrives finished, so the time the dig sits open in wet clay is short, and the gel coat surface doesn't need replastering. Families on typical subdivision lots often land on something like the Hero at 12 by 26 or the Anthem at 14 by 30. Our packages start at $68,400 installed and include Pentair lights, a variable-speed pump, a DE filter, a pool heater and the 4 foot deck. The fence, extra patio, spoils haul-off, dewatering and the power run from your panel are extras, and in Brunswick the survey is part of the budget too. We also build ICF concrete pools for custom shapes and Latham vinyl liner pools. Financing is available through lenders such as PoolLoan.net and HFS Financial.

Brunswick is in northern Medina County, on the Cuyahoga County line. We also build in Strongsville, Medina, North Royalton, Richfield and Broadview Heights.