Paris to bring back swimming in Seine after 100 years

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-66238618

by divbzero • 3 years ago

275 228 3 years ago

jaza• 3 years ago

You first!

causality0• 3 years ago

For those in the know, was this hundred year ban on swimming in the Seine due to pollution reasonable? I find it hard to wrap my head around a liberal European country letting a river stay so contaminated it's dangerous to swim in, at least in this century.

bombcar• 3 years ago

Basically heavy rains would overflow the sewer system and dump raw sewage into the river.

wnevets2• 3 years ago

I find it hard to wrap my head around a liberal European country letting a river stay so contaminated it's dangerous to swim in, at least in this century.

You may not want to look up if swimming in the Thames is safe.

worik• 3 years ago

> liberal European country letting a river stay so contaminated
You may not want to look up if swimming in the Thames is safe.

The Thames is in England

They said "liberal European...". As much as (some of) the English might hate it they are European...

nsteel• 3 years ago

But it's not banned. You can officially swim at a bunch of places, including the disgusting inner London Docklands area, as well as the dock2dock event. I think the idea is that it's fine providing you don't swallow any of the water... Everyone I know who's done it (mostly from my tri club) has gotten ill afterwards.

FredPret• 3 years ago

It's probably an infrastructure issue. Fixing old water treatment piping for a whole city that is also very old is going to be expensive!

ggm• 3 years ago

There are limits to how much remediation you can do to river water quality. Not that people shouldn't try, but if e.g. upstream sites leach heavy metals, or biological contaminants deep in ground water, there's only so much you can do.

Brisbane (where I live) the river is affectionately called 'the brown snake' mainly because of silt. Even though sand mining/dredging has ended, the river is silty still. Is that why swimming isn't recommended? No: its because upstream on oxley creek, major industrial and agricultural runoff issues during historic floods in the last 10-20 years have raised contamination, fecal coliform and other problems such that you risk serious antibiotic resistant bugs if you accidentally ingest too much, or get it in cuts (I know because I row, and a rowing colleague wound up on IV antibiotics with amputation being discussed from a deep cut)

When it floods in brisbane, associated creeks continue to leach the effects of 100+ years of industrial waste and effluent into the water. Nearby cities have land which is capped 2m deep over what was septic tank discharge, it is said that shigella is still a significant risk if you dig into the soil. I don't know, I thought it died, but perhaps it persists?

Well.. that and the bullsharks but we're talking about pollution.

Yes, the Thames is coming back to life and significant fish numbers have risen in the last decade, we're miles off "the great stink" which caused Bazalgette to construct the sewers on the riverbank. Is it always entirely safe to "be in" -well no. Sources upstream occasionally dump sewage overflow along the length of the Thames. Its meant to be emergency only, but sewage overflow has to be dealt with pretty rapidly. They try not to. What do you do, when the system is overloaded?

I am amazed Paris has been able to restore river health enough to do this. Well done!

defrost2• 3 years ago

What do you do, when the system is overloaded?

Bazalgette 2.0 - post millennium mega sewer on steroids.

    We’re building a 25km Super Sewer under the Thames to intercept those nasty spills and clean up our river for the good of the city, its wildlife and you.

https://www.tideway.london/

Impressive and hopefully enough for a few years. It's a massive project with many tunnel lines, deep sink holes to pump stations and tunnel boring machine launch and recovery points etc.

Until then - don't flush those f-ing wet wipes!! :-)

Super Sewer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZszSTjZ-i4

hermitcrab3• 3 years ago

Sources upstream occasionally dump sewage overflow along the length of the Thames.

Thames Water alone dumped raw sewage into rivers 5,028 times in 2021. I wouldn't call that 'occasionally'!:

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/apr/20/thames-w...

MattGaiser• 3 years ago

Plenty of environmentalism is just for future projects. Canada is willing to derail all sorts of new projects over pollution concerns, but it wasn't until 2020 that we stopped a pulp mill from just dumping their waste in a estuary and they thought that the government wasn't serious, so they didn't take meaningful action.

xmprt• 3 years ago

Stop the bleeding is an acceptable policy for these types of things. Just because other existing projects have pollution concerns isn't a good reason to approve new projects with pollution concerns. And once you cut off creating new projects you can slowly get through the rest of the backlog of existing issues which will either get fixed or die out eventually.

refurb2• 3 years ago

Victoria,BC has been dumping untreated sewage into the ocean up to a few years ago.

refurb2• 3 years ago

I find it hard to wrap my head around a liberal European country letting a river stay so contaminated it's dangerous to swim in, at least in this century.

I think your assumptions around liberal European countries is seriously flawed.

littlestymaar• 3 years ago

AFAIK the main problem with the Seine isn't industrial pollution, it's black water biological pollution that results of how the sewers have been designed: unlike in most cities, in Paris the sewers collect both wastewater and rainwater, but when it rains “too much” (and the ceiling isn't that high) then the system overflow to the Seine, bringing a lot of heavily poluted water to it.

jacobsenscott• 3 years ago

Well, it was fixed less than a quarter of the way through this century. For a city the size of Paris, with a sewer system more than a century old, I would say they did well.

HdS84• 3 years ago

German here. You can absolutely remediate heavily polluted rivers. Best example might be the Rhine. It was so toxic in the 70s that everything in it died. Now it's a nice river with lots of living things and you can absolutely swim in it. It's still dangerous because of ships and currents, but at least the water itself won't kill you.

But there are still lots of other rivers where remediation takes still place, e.g. because the rivers was used for raw sewage.

fransje262• 3 years ago

Yep. All the toxic stuff moved on to the Netherlands...

zokier• 3 years ago

I don't know if there are any rivers going through major european cities that I would consider safe to swim in.

You have to understand that the current-day environmentalism is only a recent phenomena, while the waters have been getting polluted for centuries. It just takes lot of time and effort to turn that around.

MrBuddyCasino• 3 years ago

The Isar in Munich is safe and people swim in it all the time. It helps that it is not navigable, except by kayaks and rubber boats (sometimes).

bigbluesax• 3 years ago

The Danube running through Vienna is safe to swim in: https://www.wien.gv.at/forschung/laboratorien/umweltmedizin/... The water quality doesn't protect you from the current or the heavy boat traffic through. So most swimming is done in a disconnected side channel called "Alte Donau".

lgvld• 3 years ago

I remember you can have a swim in Stockholm.

hannob2• 3 years ago

Well, Berlin has the same issue. Unlike Paris, it has no plan of cleaning up the Spree any time soon.

It has been discussed every now and then, but it's always too complicated, or the solutions available aren't liked by the people in charge.

arethuza• 3 years ago

I thought I had seen people swimming in the Spree - turns out it was a swimming pool floating in the Spree!

https://www.visitberlin.de/en/badeschiff-der-arena

NeoTar• 3 years ago

People swim in the Muggelsee which is basically a part of the Spree...

guruz• 3 years ago

There is an initiative that wants to have a side channel of the Spree for bathing. Close to Museumsinsel / Fischerinsel.

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flussbad_Berlin

https://www.flussbad-berlin.de/

slowmotiony2• 3 years ago

Lots of areas in Paris where you can't even walk around because it's too dangerous - the river is really the least of our problems.

hermitcrab3• 3 years ago

Is that from personal experience or hearsay?

steeve2• 3 years ago

I am Parisian. Please enlighten me where those places are so I don't go. /s

papa-whisky• 3 years ago

Poudlardo• 3 years ago

Parisian here. No way I dip even a toe on this river.

usednet• 3 years ago

In my college days I jumped in off a bridge with a French girl I met an hour before. We were both fine (I think)

coding123• 3 years ago

Wow, I would like to hear more.

defrost2• 3 years ago

You'd be inSeine if you did.

quickthrower22• 3 years ago

Or any river without DD!

Or any near-urban seawater after a first rainfall after dry spell. Because of runoff.

Arainach• 3 years ago

What's DD in this context?

skeletal88• 3 years ago

Don't use unnecessary abbreviations that are not common without introducing them first.

irrational• 3 years ago

I just read the story above about a guy jumping in the river with a French girl he had met an hour before and immediately I connected DD with the girl’s cup size.

Timshel2• 3 years ago

When it's 45°c again there will be enough people :D.

rand0m4r• 3 years ago

agreed.

Mistletoe• 3 years ago

For the 2024 Summer Olympics, swimming events will take place in that river, so authorities have spent $1.6 billion on a solution. They dug a giant reservoir to capture untreated sewage before it flows into the channel.

https://www.npr.org/2023/07/26/1190123421/after-100-years-pa...

stingraycharles• 3 years ago

Out of curiosity, does this imply there is some permanent solution implemented here that will benefit the river after the Olympics as well?

I can imagine that having a clean river is good for many things, and they will keep using this facility?

notatoad• 3 years ago

I don’t know what paris is doing here, but I doubt it.

It’s fairly standard practice for triathlons to dump a whole bunch of bleach into a lake or river to make it safe to swim in for a couple of days, but without continual treatment it quickly goes back to normal.

Timshel2• 3 years ago

Yes the goal is that three spots will become permanent in 2025.

probably_wrong• 3 years ago

Yes, they built some major infrastructure to deal with the run-off problem.

Here's an article with more details: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-66238618

Gibbon1• 3 years ago

What I distilled.

Paris like most older cities has a combined storm and sewage system. The problem always is when there is too much rain the treatment plant can't handle the volume so it get dumped into the river untreated. To fix that they're building a huge holding reservoir so they can capture sewage + storm water and feed it slowly into the waste treatment plant instead of dumping it into the Seine.

Added. I've read elsewhere that the Seine is often safe to swim in already. Hope is this will turn often safe to to always or usually safe.

MezzoDelCammin4• 3 years ago

There have been quite a few improvements since I've lived in Paris (early 2000s). I've never really tried the Seine itself, but did quite a few swims in Marne (its tributary that flows in just outside the inner city limits) and the canals.

pharmakom3• 3 years ago

So before the worlds elite athletes were coming to town, a clean river wasn’t worth it?

kergonath2• 3 years ago

They have been cleaning it for decades now, they did not start just now. It’s more of an impetus to go all the way to make it swimmable. In the end, who cares as long as the result is there?

devnullbrain2• 3 years ago

Yes. Entertainment brings in money which can be used to pay for things with positive externalities.

rospaya• 3 years ago

“I bid for the Olympics because it’s the only way to get the billions of pounds out of the government to develop the East End,” he said in 2008.

Ken Livingstone, former mayor of London. It's not for the athletes, but it's because of them.

ugiox• 3 years ago

Swimming in the Rhine river in Basel (Switzerland) has been possible for a long time and is even officially sanctioned by the city https://www.basel.com/en/activities-excursions/swimming-rhin...

refactor_master• 3 years ago

Swimming in the Copenhagen harbor (Denmark) is also possible

https://www.visitcopenhagen.com/copenhagen/activities/baths-...

It might have a slight upper hand in cleanliness with being directly connected to the sea.

harry8• 3 years ago

Swimming in Sydney Harbour is also possible. They did it for a leg of the triathalon in the olympics a couple of decades back. Wouldn't recommend though, there's a lot of bull sharks in there and they're kinda aggressive. Netted beaches and bays are the go.

cs02rm0• 3 years ago

I saw that, a bit further along from Kastrup sea bath, with the planes coming in to land at the airport.

I guess it's open water unlike the Seine, but it did surprise me, I felt like I was sat in quite an industrial area when a couple walked past in swimming costumes and towels.

vasco• 3 years ago

The canals in Copenhagen are pristine compared to cities like Amsterdam. I'd dip in there any time!

kristiandupont• 3 years ago

I go in every morning. Massive quality of life factor, that!

tokai• 3 years ago

Clean as long as you don't disturb all the mercury in the top layer of the bed.

kmlx• 3 years ago

i’ll chip in for London.

while the thames can be swam upriver of Putney Bridge, there are conditions as the Thames is a busy river. but there are other spots in London where one can do wild swimming.

for example:

london royal docks https://loveopenwater.co.uk/swimming-london-royal-docks/

canary wharf: https://canarywharf.com/whats-on/open-water-swimming/

the famous ponds in hampstead heath: https://www.cityoflondon.gov.uk/things-to-do/green-spaces/ha...

the famous hyde park lido: https://www.royalparks.org.uk/parks/hyde-park/things-to-see-...

ClumsyPilot2• 3 years ago

I might add, these places are not part of the river Thames and have their own sources of water for the most part

snovv_crash• 3 years ago

So is swimming in the Aare river in Bern, Limmat and Sihl rivers in Zürich, and the Arve and Rhône in Geneva. Floating down in tubes is a popular summer pastime.

saiya-jin• 3 years ago

Arve + Rhone in Geneva Jonction = pretty spectacle from Jonction bridge, where two distinct waters meet - crystal-clear Rhone which comes down from limestone (majority) part of Alps, has time settle any silt in Geneva lake, so it has easily 15m visibility, jut like most seas.

On the other side, Arve coming down from France is muddied right at the source by Mont blanc range, which is mostly granite. You can see the exact spot where specific stream comes into play, very gray, and it doesn't get much better afterwards.

Its enough to get big river like Rhone dirty all the way to Mediterranean sea. Also, after Jonction Rhone becomes pretty cold to just swim in even in warmest summer days. But yes many tkae it down during summer on inflatables, including us.

AndyMcConachie• 3 years ago

Rotterdam here. People swim in the Maas all the time. Just be careful of the container ships and other water traffic.

There are lots of canals and rivers all across The Netherlands and people are swimming in them more and more. When I used to live in Utrecht the idea of swimming in the Oudegracht was disgusting. But I was visiting last month and saw people doing it. I still wouldn't swim in that canal.

k__• 3 years ago

I often went swimming in the Rhine as a child in Germany, around 50km south of Frankfurt.

We had a rubble beach and the river only was 1m deep for half its width.

Was pretty nice. The water was colder than in the lakes and it came with a natural counter-current system, so you could swim in-place.

secretsatan• 3 years ago

Many (Most) of the rivers and lakes are swimmable in Switzerland, the standards for water are incredibly high, more dangerous is not knowing the currents.

Going down the Aare river from Thun/Uttigen to Bern is a hugely popular activity to do in summer, but every year a few people drown. Even so, I'd recommend it.

https://madeinbern.com/en/stories/along-the-aare-river-2#:~:...).

maurits• 3 years ago

Swiss river swimming is one of the highlights of my year.

jacquesm5• 3 years ago

That far upstream is probably safer than say in NL.

wdavidw• 3 years ago

I live on a boat on the seine river in meudon, facing boulogne, just outide of paris downhill, about 15mn biking from eiffel towel. Me and our neighboors enjoy swiming and padding on hot days, many friends are fishing just outside our windows. Like mentioned in the article, we don’t go in the water after heaving rains. It is a wonderful environment with trees and fresh air.

consumer4516• 3 years ago

we don’t go in the water after heaving rains.

I cannot emphasize enough how important this part is. I have a major incurable health issue from ignoring this rule.

konschubert• 3 years ago

Is this general advice or specific to Paris?

And what is the background here?

crossroadsguy2• 3 years ago

You can just live on a boat on a river? I assume it would involve permissions from authorities and some kind of rent etc, right? What do you do for water, electricity, sanitary services, garbage collection et cetera?

robfitz• 3 years ago

There are plenty of river ports/quays with power and water hookups. If you want to houseboat it, you really only need to move when you want to dump the septic tank (and in some areas, not even that).

The "good" spots are highly desirable and usually privately owned (or on a very long-term lease), and you often need to buy a boat to get the mooring spot beneath it. (A buddy of mine in London ended up with 3 boats while upgrading his mooring spot.)

Another options is to vagabond it, where you move your boat to a new area every week or two -- this is usually unserviced, so it's more like camping, but lets you use unofficial spots and is free.

(The last option is to find goofy loopholes. E.g., in some areas of the Thames, you can create a nesting habitat for an endangered bird on your boat, and then once the bird settles in, they can't force you to move, since doing so would destroy an important habitat. Sounds stupid but a surprising number of permanent city boats are there on some sort of loophole.)

tharax• 3 years ago

Google “houseboats <european city>” and you’ll see how they are moored and connected to services. There’s many good videos on YouTube doing tours of boats if you want to go down a rabbit hole.

conradfr• 3 years ago

Of course you can, Duncan MacLeod is living in one in the Highlander TV show [0] ;)

Many are also "fixed" restaurants, bars / nightclubs.

[0] https://twitter.com/yohannmultipass/status/11181422507883151...

bambax• 3 years ago

The distance from, say, Île Seguin to the Eiffel tower is more like 8km; certainly less than 10.

I also live in Meudon (in the hills); I recently bought an inflatable kayak to try it on the Seine but have not dared use it yet, and so far also failed to convince my kids to try it with me ;-(

StackOverlord• 3 years ago

    Here we are, born to be kings
    We're the princes of the universe
    Here we belong, fighting to survive
    In a world with the darkest powers
    Heh
    And here we are, we're the princes of the universe
    Here we belong, fighting for survival
    We've come to be the rulers of you all

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypyvcfnu4Gg

MezzoDelCammin4• 3 years ago

For a bit of added context - swimming in Seine is way less risky already these days. The son of mayor of Paris has made a bit of a name for himself when he swam down the whole length of the river in 2021:

https://www.thelocal.fr/20210224/paris-mayor-anne-hidalgos-s...

nerdbert3• 3 years ago

Himself?

MezzoDelCammin4• 3 years ago

what do You mean? As far as I know, he was accompanied on occasions by some media. But yes, he did the swimming himself.

woodpanel• 3 years ago

While certainly not the intention of media outlets worldwide abetting this PR stunt of a socialist mayor, it does highlight the question of

a) was the Seine (or any urban river) really that much cleaner 100 years ago?

b) since most cities with a polluted river tend to be situated down-stream – what actually did mayor Hidalgo really do in order to demand the praise here? I assume not much other than stop enforcing restrictions?

seszett2• 3 years ago

PR stunt of a socialist mayor

Although the mayor who actually does it is socialist, it was initiated by a right-wing mayor (Jacques Chirac, who went on to become president) famously announcing he would himself swim in the Seine in the 90s (he didn't).

a) it was probably not cleaner 100 years ago, but that's the year when swimming in the Seine was banned because of pollution

b) Paris is not really downstream of any large city on the Seine and most of the pollution by far is produced by Paris and its suburbs, not by Troyes 150 km upstream.

What they are doing to reduce pollution is explained in detail in the linked article.

omnibrain• 3 years ago

socialist

This word doesn't have the same meaning in Europe, than it has in the US. "Socialist" mainly describes some sort of social democratism, even when some people calling themselves socialist won't accept that label for themselves.

On the other hand in the US you seem to call everything left of the republicans "socialist" and everything left of right wing democrats "marxist". And you even label totally unrelated things like gender expression "marxist".

pjc502• 3 years ago

The phenomenon of Americans calling things like "working public transport" or "clean water" "communism" has led to a reaction where people who want all sorts of perfectly normal social-democrat things start labelling themselves as "communist" on the internet. It's very silly.

rsynnott• 3 years ago

really that much cleaner 100 years ago?

_Cleaner_? I'd assume it was _far_ worse 100 years ago.

I'm not sure what the mayor being socialist has to do with it. All across Europe, in every political system, there are water cleanup projects. Pretty much any big old city is going to have these problems unless you do _serious_ remediation.

mcv4• 3 years ago

I'm not sure what the mayor being socialist has to do with it.

Socialists tend to be more interested in public access to common goods. Swimmable rivers seem relevant. A neoliberal mayor would probably prefer people to pay to swim in commercial swimming pools.

sideshowb• 3 years ago

Meanwhile in the UK https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-57947635

curiousgal• 3 years ago

You have always been able to swim in the Thames albeit only in Canary Wharf.

hermitcrab3• 3 years ago

As an occasional kayaker and outdoor swimmer I am appalled at what greedy water companies (looking at you, Thames Water) and sloppy environmental enforcement have done to river and beaches in the UK. It is an absolute disgrace that the government have allowed the current state of affairs.

devnullbrain2• 3 years ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andy_Holmes#Biography

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Ramsey_(mathematician)#E...

w-m• 3 years ago

My aunt used to live in Paris. I remember, she used to come home and tell us these stories about being abroad. And I remember she told us that she jumped into the river once, barefoot. She smiled, leapt without looking and tumbled into the Seine.

The water was freezing, she spent a month sneezing, but said she would do it again. Here's to the ones who dream, foolish as they may seem. Here's to the hearts that ache, here's to the mess we make.

milanhbs• 3 years ago

I live in Basel, Switzerland, where it is common sport to jump into the river Rhine on a hot day, and float right through historic downtown. It’s a marvellous thing, even just to watch. Really adds to quality of life! Edit: Missed the other comment by a fellow Baseler.

ggambetta• 3 years ago

Same on the Limmat in Zürich, such a relaxing 2-hour float down the river (only interrupted by the deadly dam in the middle).

01acheru4• 3 years ago

I would like to post a small advice: know the river or lake before you go swimming into it. If you don't ask the locals.

I'm from northern Italy and we have a lot of small rivers and lakes here, from the outside most of them seem pretty innocent but there are drownings every single year.

Most people that drown here are immigrants that don't know how treacherous an alpine river or lake might be, it usually happens in the summer and is always a sad story to hear. A couple of weeks ago two people died in my province: the son went swimming, an undercurrent pulled him under the surface, then his father tried to save him and got pulled under in the same way.

Please be careful!

asymmetric• 3 years ago

Do you know if there are public resources one can check to know how to stay safe, or is asking locals the best options? My only gripe with that is that it’s not always possible, one might find oneself by a seemingly nice river/lake with nobody around.

01acheru4• 3 years ago

I'm sorry but I don't know any source for this kind of data, if there is nobody around to ask to then it is up on you to risk it.

dghughes• 3 years ago

I saw a video of a small stream and I mean small just 2m across a bit more in other places but it can be 10m deep! It looks like you can step in to your knees but really it's very deep.

It's in England it is called Bolton Strid. I'm not in England myself I just read about it.

jacquesm5• 3 years ago

That's the most dangerous stream in Europe afaik.

jfim2• 3 years ago

Out of curiosity, what's dangerous about Alpine lakes? I understand that rivers can have currents that can pull and hold people underwater, but I can't think of a risk for lakes other than hypothermia.

ceejayoz2• 3 years ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_shock_response

Miraste• 3 years ago

On jumping in, you can get cold water shock, which can cause involuntary gasping and loss of muscle control, leading to immediate drowning. The water doesn't even have to be that cold.

01acheru4• 3 years ago

I can only answer for the lakes near where I live and that I know, for example Lake Iseo o Lake Como.

They might look all calm and placid, but they are really deep with steep shores that are pretty irregular, think of them as a valley between two mountains filled with water with water coming in from one side and going out from the other (that's exactly what they are actually). The water flows more rapidly beneath the surface and creates turbulences due to the irregularities of the shores, so now there are two things:

- those turbulences might pull you under very rapidly, many meters below the surface, and that might cause you a shock. If you pass out when that happens, well... you're dead.

- those turbulences and the currents sometimes detach boulders or other chunks of rock, when this happens water needs to fill the void left by the fallen rock and if you are unlucky to be in that water it can pull you down for tens of meters. 10m of water on your head increase the pressure by ~1atm, if you get pulled under by 20/30m in just a second you will pass out for sure and as in the other point... you're dead for sure.

If you go to one of those lakes and want to swim you must stay close to the shore and you must enter the lake where the shore is not steep or else you'll be risking it.

Lake Garda, Lake Idro, Lake Moro and other are very much safe on the other hand. That's why asking a local person is often wise: it just takes a couple of minutes to find someone and ask, after you know you're safe get into the water and enjoy :)

cameronh90• 3 years ago

Interestingly, undercurrents aren't as common as people think.

Most currents can't pull you under the water. There are notable exceptions such as obstructions, dams and rapids which can form "keepers", or sudden depth or width changes that can make the water flow extremely fast and turbulent beneath the surface (such as the strid), but those sorts of situations aren't that common.

Most drownings in rivers and lakes where someone was apparently pulled under are actually due to cold water shock. The water beneath the surface of a river can be extremely cold, which can immediately paralyse even the most experienced swimmer.

Worse, sometimes the water can be a lot colder than other times, or colder in the middle than at the sides, meaning the river could be safe sometimes and not other times, and it might seem fine when you first get in, only to find you rapidly fatigue as you move further away from the bank.

01acheru4• 3 years ago

That's why I'm posting this advice, they are not common if you count all lakes and all rivers in the world but they are very common in the rivers and lakes near where I live for example.

That's why most drownings around here happen to immigrants: local people know that it is crazy to go swimming in some places, because they know that something bad happened to a lot of swimmers over the years in those points, but if you don't know that history it is easy to make that possibly fatal mistake.

rurban2• 3 years ago

For a more technical explanation, because we had the same problem in our city, and fixed it in a similar way:

One of the main problems has been the 19th-Century "single system" drainage infrastructure, which unites household waste water from kitchens and toilets with run-off from rain on the street.

Big cities came up with their canalization in the 18th century in two ways: open or closed canals. A closed canal system (with proper tubes) would be safe, no dirt (street dirt, mostly dog shit) could overspill on heavy summer rains into the canals and river, but this would require about 10x larger tubes, just for the few summer days (about 10 days a year). And a normal river with normal oxygen levels can easily fixup itself after such a spill. I.e. a flowing river, no dams near cities. And no industrial sewage directly into the river (which does not happen in civilized countries since the 80ies).

Almost every european city uses an open canal system, where in those few heavy rain days during the summer (and this can likely happen during summer olympics), the canal gates need to be opened so that the street water can overspill into the river, and it mixes with the dirt water from the open canal. So you do have heavy shit pollution in the river for about 3 days. No swimming, bad smell, E.Coli poisoning, rat bacteria (black plague).

So what a few richer cities, or the stupid ones which destroyed the natural cleaning abilities of the river by building dams near their cities for electricity (such as my city Graz, Austria), had to do, was to build such huge overspill cylinders or side canals to keep it from flowing directly into the river, but into their water treatment plant instead.

With more southern cities this would be impossible, as the rainfall is too heavy. E.g. in Houston you'll get a downpoor for 20minutes, with streets and canals flooded, cars need to stop, but then it goes on. In such subtropical cities you cannot think of building closed canal systems or such side spill reservoirs. The peek volume is way too high to be able to control it. And their rivers do contain poisonous snakes and alligators anyway.

fransje262• 3 years ago

A closed canal system (with proper tubes) would be safe, no dirt (street dirt, mostly dog shit) could overspill on heavy summer rains into the canals and river

There is a logic step I'm missing here. I fail to see how a closed canal system is safer. Will the dirty water not, by definition, end up in the lowest point anyway, i.e. the river? Whether the canals are open or closed? I mean, the dirty water is not just going to disappear, is it?

ceejayoz2• 3 years ago

In a closed system, the lowest point typically leads to a water treatment plant.

In an open system, too, but the open system can overflow into nearby watersheds.

beembeem• 3 years ago

The problem you didn't touch on specifically is that it still makes sense to separate sewage from runoff, which is not cheap and becoming increasingly common in major US cities. Untreated sewage mixed with storm runoff makes for far worse water quality conditions than merely runoff.

rurban2• 3 years ago

Sure, a closed system is always preferred. But bigger cities just cannot afford to change all tubes now. Some did though. Paris or my city are just too big, or don't have enough time/budget.

cool_dude85• 3 years ago

And their rivers do contain poisonous snakes and alligators anyway.

Alligators and poisonous snakes are not as much of an impediment to swimming as you would think. Here in Florida, we have plenty of people swimming in springs, lakes, and rivers that have gators in or nearby. The gators know to stay far away from people whose splashing and noise disrupt the fish and small animals they eat.

You can go to springs that get absolutely packed full all summer long, to where you can't swing your arms without hitting someone else, canoe 100yd outside the (unmarked) swimming area, and see gators sitting idly by near the banks without a care in the world.

sourcecodeplz• 3 years ago

I dunno, used to do things like this when I was a poor kid but not anymore. Too many chemicals in todays world.

Broken_Hippo• 3 years ago

I can almost promise you that there were just as many chemicals then - if not more.

I'm in my 40s, and river pollution started decades if not at least a century before I was born. You just weren't as aware as a child.

contingencies• 3 years ago

FWIW people swim every day in Sydney harbour - some naked - although some parts are polluted and there are sharks, one of whom took a chunk out of a navy diver. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/australasia/bull-sh...

zx2c4• 3 years ago

I love the initiative, of course. How could I not? The idea of folks casually taking a dip in this city is really nice. I spend a lot of time beside the Seine - writing code on my laptop, even! - and being able to dangle my legs in sounds nice.

But... No matter what they say about bacteria measurements and other high quality quantitative indicators, there will still be swimming bags of potato chips and cigarette cartons and beer cans and receipts, and all the other junk Parisians tend to toss in there, even the occasional Vélib' bicycle. The thought of going for a nice swim only to whack my foot on a rusted underwater bicycle gear and then leave the water with a sandwich wrapper clinging to my back isn't very appealing. So I wonder how this will be managed, and how separated the three proposed swimming spots will be.

With that said, I went swimming in the Ohio River as a child, and I guess I'm still alive, so ¯ \ _ ( ツ ) _ / ¯

Galanwe• 3 years ago

You forgot dead animals and syringes

jacquesm5• 3 years ago

And between 20 and 50 dead people every year.

sneak• 3 years ago

Seems that this could be addressed separately with better enforcement for littering/dumping?

People there don't regularly assault people on the street, brandish firearms, or drive vehicles without number plates. There is a possibility for law enforcement to set social expectations around dumping such that people don't actually do it out of fear of serious legal consequences.

citrin_ru• 3 years ago

How you imagine this? Police don't have free resources already and it is hard to catch a person throwing a bottle in a river in the moment. Video surveillance and face recognition may work but sounds dystopian.

In my observation a mix of culture and working cleaning services is a better predictor of clean streets than fines. It matters a lot if people want to live in a clean environment or they don't care. I have an empathy gap here and it's hard to understand why but I see that some people either don't mind garbage lying around or too lazy to carry it to a place where it can be disposed (nearest litter bin if they exist in this area or home if not).

scrollaway2• 3 years ago

there will still be swimming bags of potato chips and cigarette cartons and beer cans and receipts, and all the other junk Parisians tend to toss in there

Time to enforce littering fines.

Seriously, as a French person living in Belgium, I am disgusted with how little of a shit people give about keeping their own city clean.

If we start enforcing littering fines a bit more in western europe, this shit will stop within a couple of years. It's 100% cultural and this is something we absolutely have to change in our culture.

cromka• 3 years ago

As much as I hate it, the real way to achieve the level of compliance you describe is through surveillance, akin to what China does or what Black Mirror depicts.

ardit33• 3 years ago

Western Europe has always been cleaner than both Eastern Europe, and the US, but things have been backsliding.

Things have recently changed for the worse. eg. I was in Paris, and I could see a stark contrast between now and 10 years ago. Also, parts of Italy seem to be backsliding, and then you have parts of Croatia that look better than many western parts.

Ps. In the US, NYC and SF are pretty 'dirty' overall, but then you have mid tier cities such as Miami, Boston, D.C., that are and feel very clean overall.

yodsanklai3• 3 years ago

I think most people do care about keeping their city clean, at least in western Europe. The problem is that it's enough for a very small fraction of the people to ruin it for everybody else. Besides, I'm not sure if littering fines work. I'm all for it, but the risk to get caught is incredibly low. I mean, 700000 persons driving without driving licence in France, bikes get stolen like there's no tomorrow, I could go on and on... nobody cares about fines.

croisillon• 3 years ago

people swim in the Danube in Vienna, so it doesn't sound impossible

insanitybit• 3 years ago

Hopefully this introduces pressure to actually get littering taken more seriously. If there are communities who want to swim, but feel uncomfortable about it, those communities can begin to pressure the government to deal with those problems.

Given that the article mentions that there will be officially held races/ marathons, I suspect that there will be a lot of money being put into keeping the water clean and safe. It seems like the city has been very invested in improving the water quality of the Seine and I expect that to continue with the additional pressure of human swimmers.

badrabbit• 3 years ago

Size is the only difference to swimming in the ocean or a lake, unlike lakes though, rivers flow and move the trash away

bsaul4• 3 years ago

Rented a boat on the seine once, close to Paris ( near boulogne). We saw people swimming right next to our boat. The problem is that we also knew the boat watercloset went directly outside in the river. You could even see the stream of water and feces rushing out everytime you flushed it.

Felt a bit sorry for those guys.

s_dev2• 3 years ago

There are rules about when you can empty those bilge tanks -- you don't do it when docked and you don't do it when travelling up a river with people swimming in it.

bsaul4• 3 years ago

i don't think there was any tank. Just a pipe going straight from the WC to the river.

yardie• 3 years ago

This must have been a really old boat that was grandfathered in before EU RCD rules went into effect. You never really get away from feces in the water. Any natural body is going to have fish, animal, and even human waste. But you can control for the quantity. Water plant life is hugely important to natural filtering. They can be overwhelmed and destroyed by stormwater, sewage runoff, and chemical runoff.

Reubachi• 3 years ago

Welp, what you did was illegal and It seems that since that incident you haven't realized that.

next time drop the bilge....in a spot that common sense would dictate.

bsaul4• 3 years ago

i rented the boat via airbnb, and we did absolutely nothing special. I know nothing about boats but my intuition was that this boat had a direct hose from the WC to the river. It's those kinds of appartment boat that remain docked all year long and probably don't even have a working engine.

Sharlin• 3 years ago

Uh, typically these days it’s only legal to dump bilge water or toilet waste at a port, into a receptable connected to the normal blackwater system.

MisterTea2• 3 years ago

You could even see the stream of water and feces rushing out everytime you flushed it.

What you did was illegal. Boats are not allowed to discharge waste into water inland or at sea unless 10 miles out at sea (USA and I'm sure most other nations). If caught the fines are quite severe. You must flush into a holding tank which is emptied by vacuum while at port. OR discharge once far out at sea.

Though since you rented this was likely operator error due to inexperience. Some boats have different plumbing systems with a Y valve that diverts to holding tank or overboard. Some boats have no Y valve so they flush directly into a tank that also has a macerator pump that empties the tank while at sea. The pump switch is usually on the dashboard OR sometimes in the bathroom and people mistake the macerator pump button for the flush button. Or they try to turn something on the dash and hit the macerator pump switch by accident.

Next time you rent a boat please make sure you are familiar with the sewage system function. The rental facility will show you how it operates properly.

bsaul4• 3 years ago

this boat probably didn't even have a working engine. It's those kinds of appartment boat that never moves and remain docked all year long...

I was surprised as well, but there was nothing we could do. Flushing the WC directly triggered the thing.

jschveibinz• 3 years ago

With climate change raising water temperatures in lakes, ponds and potentially rivers, it’s important to remember the risk of N. fowleri (brain eating amoeba):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naegleria_fowleri

codyb• 3 years ago

I saw folk swimming in the East River off of Queens here in NYC and I was really pumped. I may have to check that spot out this year. There's whales and seals again in the harbor too. It's amazing what decades of focused effort and time can do to clean up places. May we continue to do this the world round as we collectively grow to care for our planet a bit more (in order to preserve ourselves of course) here.

js2• 3 years ago

The oldest standing bridge across the Seine is Pont Neuf, "New Bridge", of course. It's the setting for the remarkable film Les Amants du Pont-Neuf:

https://youtu.be/y2OjjtY1A80

This is what I think of whenever I see the Seine in the news.

Internet Archive has the full movie:

https://archive.org/details/les.-amants.-du.-pont-neuf-1991

Paris to bring back swimming in Seine after 100 years

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