Icon Brickell pool deck will close for a year or more

The popular two-acre pool deck at the Icon Brickell condominium in Miami soon will close for repairs for at least a year.

The master association of Icon Brickell notified owners Tuesday that the 1,650-unit condo will close for a year or longer on December 5. Unit owners may pay a special assessment for the repairs, estimated to cost approximately $14 million.

The popular pool deck overlooking Biscayne Bay features an infinity pool the size of a football field, a hot tub with seating capacity for 80 and a life-sized chess set.

An email obtained by the Miami Herald detailed the scope of the repair work, which will include new waterproofing, newly installed drainage, and new lighting and landscaping. Plans also call for conversion of a reflection pool to a kids’ pool and construction of stairs to an observation deck.

The Herald last January reported the problems at the pool deck, which triggered ongoing lawsuits against John Moriarty & Associates, the general contractor of Icon Brickell, the development’s architecture firm Arquitectonica, and more than 20 subcontractors. Unit owners complained that the tiles on the pool deck were too slippery and that the faulty piping for the pool was leaking water into the garage below.

Icon Brickell was developed during the last real estate cycle by Miami-based Related Group, though the company turned over two of the project’s three towers to lender HSBC as part of a settlement to cover Related’s outstanding $351 million loan. [Miami Herald] — Mike Seemuth