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+Pool Would Let New Yorkers Go River Swimming
cylonlover writes "Three young entrepreneurs have proposed a way of getting New Yorkers into the Hudson, East and/or Bronx Rivers. It's called the +Pool (Plus Pool) — a public swimming pool that would float in the river, allowing people to swim in filtered river water. River water would flow into the pool through permeable walls, which would be composed of three layers filtering out the river nasties."
If they can get away with doing this sans toxic chemicals like Chlorine and Bromine, I say GOOD FOR THEM!
Swimming pools are a toxic soup of deadly chemicals like Chlorine, Bromine, Cyanuric Acid, Sodium Bisulphate and Sodium Carbonate. Even 'saltwater' pools use these to maintain pH and limit algae growth.
Over the years there have been numerous reports of Chiropractor-diagnosed illness in which the subluxation contained extraordinarily high levels of Chlorine. Considering that many people love to swim in toxins, it's no surprise that this is the case. All those chemicals seeping in through the skin directly into your bloodstream and nervous system, especially through the thinner skin of the back: BAM! A subluxation before you're even out of the pool.
This pool may be a great thing for swimming in clean, chemical-free water, but the people will still be breathing heavily. That will get them taking in all sorts of polluted NYC air. Watch for Chiropractic offices popping up around this pool to help with swimmers' health maintainance issues!
Take care,
Bob
Chiropractic Saves Lives!
I don't want some New Yorker peeing in my pool.
...to filter out the New Yorkers.
Still too nasty for me.
The rivers smell so bad, I'd think the biggest problem would be convincing people to get near them, let alone in them. I think they'd have to be enclosed.
Unmentioned in the article is that one also needs the conventional cleaning system to clean the water from (speaking carefully now) pollutants generated internally, too.
What happens in winter?
as opposed to the normal everyday minus pool
They're called "ocean swimming pools", and have been around for over a hundred years now. Help yourself to a google image search and enjoy the beautiful images.
Sure, filtering for parasites, and particulate waste is fine, but what about chemicals?
What was all that business about New York water showing unnatural traces of caffeine and acetaminophen?
The cost of insurance for a venture such as this would be outrageous!
They could use these magical three layers to filter farther upstream where likely several inconsiderate companies are flushing nasties into the river and make those companies pay for it. THEN people could swim in the river like they should be able to. Letting people put nasties into the river is the problem. Duh.
How those Jersey Shore people get their orange "tans".
I eat only the real part of complex carbohydrates.
I thought US Airways already tried to do this with an old Airbus A-320 back in '09? It wasn't quite as popular back then because it was January and frigid,. . .
...and what exactly is the point? To separate the rich hedonists from a little more of their disposable income? I sure don't see those of us commoners being able to take "advantage" of such a ridiculous luxury.
Nice Slashvertisement.
Maintenance costs would kill this thing quickly, as would the passage of chemicals the filters failed to catch. Cleaning the inside of a pool sucks, but cleaning BOTH sides? Lovely.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
In the narrow sense, this seems like a reasonably clever, if not entirely novel solution; but in the broader sense it leaves me skeptical.
If your river has sufficiently high levels of pathogenic viruses and bacteria that it isn't swimmable, you should seriously consider pretending to be a first-world country for 15 minutes and check out this cool "sanitation systems, so you don't have to drink and swim in your own shit!" fad that all the cool civil engineers have been nattering on about since, oh, the Roman Empire or so...
If your river has sufficiently high levels of chemical nasties and heavy metals that it isn't swimmable, trusting a pool filter to remove them probably isn't the best idea, and maybe you should be doing something about the 'chemical plants upstream of major population centers' problem. Isn't that stuff supposed to be in New Jersey, anyway?
If your swimmers just can't handle the terror of a little silt or the normal flora of a watershed ecosystem, maybe they need a psych referral, not a pool filter.
I've been seeing this same copy and image set for nearly two years now, here and there online. Will this just keep getting rehashed until it gets the funding/approvals that it needs?
Reply to That ||
If the pool IS the filter, how would you go about cleaning/changing the filters so they filter properly? Change the entire pool out? I can't think of any other way to do it. It's just like my reverse-osmosis water system. The filters clog, and need replacing or cleaning. There's no way to do that here.
Bite my shiny metal ass!
The "East River" is what people outside of New York City like to call the Atlantic Ocean.
You can already go swimming in it, but as I understand it the idea here is to let you swim in the ocean without worrying about jellyfish, the tide pulling you out to sea, or the occasional shark frightening you.
You can also go swimming in the Hudson which is an actual river. There it is best to stay within the designated swimming areas mostly because it's relatively easy to get washed out to sea.
Yeah yeah, it's a radical idea. But maybe if you didn't dump so much crap in the the East River, it wouldn't be hazardous to swim in.
The world is made by those who show up for the job.
Your insinuation that Chlorine is a carcinogin is not supported by science or even anecdotal experience.
The main problem with swimming pools & chlorine causing irritation is ironically caused by *not enough* chlorine, since the the chlorine combines with septic materials to form chloramines. which are highly irritating to people. Look it up on Wikipedia, its basically forms of ammonia.
In fact, most swimming pools would benefit from significantly higher levels of chlorine. It would be safer and cleaner.
Chlorine gets a bad rap from people who generally don't know what they're talking about, or have something expensive to sell you.
And yes, I have decades of pool experience.
The picture shows the view of Manhattan from Hoboken, NJ. Those aren't New Yorkers in the picture. Those are the Jerseyites that we so love to make fun of!
Seems like that would be an even better idea. But what do I know?
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...it filters out hypodermic needles?
On a more serious note, last time I docked my boat at a marina in NYC (on my way to the long island sound), not only was the water disgustingly dirty, but the smell was overbearing. The rest of my family stayed in a hotel the rest of the night while I roughed it out on the boat to keep an eye on things. In the morning, a garbage truck showed up to empty some of the large garbage bins out. When they lifted it up with the truck, the liquid sludge in the bottom of the bin started to leak out the bottom. They then drove it over to the edge, and let it empty into the river. I have never smelled a worse smell in my entire life.
I love NYC and NY in general. But swimming in the water down there? No thanks.
"I hope you know how very lucky you are to know me, because I am so incredibly incredible."
The earliest story was about the desgin idea ......the recent news is that they are in stage three ie material & prototype testing and have a kickstarter campaign running until July 15th.
Stage two funding was self funded by a few groups with the in-house expertise.
So given the timeline I think they are advancing this project at a decent pace and that an update on the project is warranted.
New Yorkers in general have dirty mouths. How are they planning to clean ~that water? Ok, I'm kidding. Hey, don't make me do this.. Fuhgettaboutit!
Thanks
Reply to That ||
Maybe this is a dumb question, but what about something like the pool plus, except not in the river? I mean the swimming pool is an old idea, what the point of putting it in a river? Why not put it next to the river, treat the water river water with chlorine, put it in the pool, and dump the old water back into the river or just down the sewer?
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KRAMER: Well my swimming pool problems are solved. I just found myself miles and miles of open lanes.
JERRY: What is that smell?
KRAMER: That's East River.
JERRY: You're swimming in the East River? The most heavily trafficked overly contaminated waterway on the eastern seaboard?
KRAMER: Technically Norfolk has more gross tonnage.
JERRY: How could you swim in that water?
KRAMER: I saw a couple of other guys out there.
JERRY: Swimming?
KRAMER: Floating, they weren't moving much. But they were out there.
A pool in the hudson would be filled with a lot of dihydrogen monoxide. This might be the main hazard people will be exposed to.
Dihydrogen monoxide:
is called "hydroxyl acid", the substance is the major component of acid rain.
contributes to the "greenhouse effect".
may cause severe burns.
is fatal if inhaled.
contributes to the erosion of our natural landscape.
accelerates corrosion and rusting of many metals.
may cause electrical failures and decreased effectiveness of automobile brakes.
has been found in excised tumors of terminal cancer patients.
Despite the danger, dihydrogen monoxide is often used:
as an industrial solvent and coolant.
in nuclear power plants.
in the production of Styrofoam.
as a fire retardant.
in many forms of cruel animal research.
in the distribution of pesticides. Even after washing, produce remains contaminated by this chemical.
as an additive in certain "junk-foods" and other food products.
PS.. mod as funny ;)
Or they could just swim in the river like normal people. People swim in the hudson all the time, and it is a busy river for recreational boating. Absolutely nothing wrong with that water. City folk and other yuppie snobs like those who can afford or would want to live in the city see anything but clear water as dirty. News flash: Most rivers are murky and do not have great clarity, especially tidal rivers that are dredged for big shipping traffic.
It would never work. You can take the river water out of New York, but you just can't get the New York out of the river.
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia
...one of the most sad an pathetic stories I've read this week. The idea is genius, but the need for it is an indictment.
I8-D
I find the idea moderately interesting. But, the article says that the water would be filtered by the permeable membrains. I don't know if the laws are different in NY, but here in FL, any non-residential swimming pool has to have a pump and filter running 24x7, so I'm guessing this is also true here. The membranes keep the big junk out and the traditional pumps and filters keep the water somewhat clean.
If this actually came about, it would probably be a fad that people found interesting for a year or so and then interest would probably die off. I'd be interested to know how many times the water is changed per hour/day/week, etc. If the membranes only change 10% of the water a day, I don't know that I'd want to swim in it. If they don't chlorinate the water and 20 people take a leak in it, I don't want to be swimming in there.
I was in New York a few years ago and the river water didn't seem all that bad.
... are using Pool++
Would you drink a litre of radioactivity?
Radioactivity is energy. You cannot measure it in volume. You could say something like a liter of radioactive waste, but of course that doesn't tell you how much radioactivity is involved, as you could have a very small amount of radioactive material in a liter of otherwise uninteresting water.
You didn't actually study physics in college, did you?
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