The Mercy Drive Community Center was a recreation and community service complex designed by Architects Design Group, jointly operated by the City of Orlando and Orange County. As part of ADG’s design, the 16.35-acre site featured a 25,000-SF city recreation building, a 20,200-SF county services building, and a multitude of site recreational program areas. The recreation building housed a multi-function gymnasium, scaled for full-court use in both directions, management offices, Police Athletic League offices, weight / equipment rooms, community / game rooms, general / ceramics classrooms, a multipurpose auditorium, and recreation building support rooms.
The county services building was designed to house a head start program with classrooms, offices, and exterior play areas, offices for food stamp services, classrooms and offices for community education management offices, and rooms for Health Department Services. Included in the site recreation areas are four basketball courts, two tennis courts, two baseball / softball fields, a multipurpose utility field, a tot-lot, two picnic areas and an Olympic size swimming pool with a bathhouse and sun shelter. The complex was an inner city, intra-neighborhood development and an important addition to the middle west area of Orlando.
