Part of the Seine River will transform into a popular swimming pool, and the Mayor of Paris: for the first time in a century, the swimming ban will be lifted | Seine | Paris

Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo announced on the 9th that starting from 2025, three locations along the Seine River will transform into mass swimming pools, marking the first time in a century. Since 1923, playing in the beautiful Seine River has been a wish for many people, but concerns about pollution and safety have deterred them. At present, the 2024 Paris Olympics bring new opportunities.

After a hundred years

For someone like Idalgo, who has been looking forward to it for a long time, although they will have to wait for two more years, their wish to play on the Seine River will soon come true.

"Starting from 2025, we can swim in the Seine River!" Idalgo posted a video on social media platform Twitter that day with an accompanying text. My deputies have already gone into the water for the first time! It will soon be your and my turn.

This video shows that in the center of Paris, the Bras Marie Water Sports Center is equipped with drainage facilities, and people jump off the lawn and play in the water to their heart's content

Idalgo explained that the other two drainage points will be located in Grenacle in the 15th arrondissement of Paris and Bessie in the 12th arrondissement, both of which are not far from well-known landmarks such as the Eiffel Tower.

According to the Paris City Hall, these three water play areas will be divided by buoys. At that time, people can enter the water through a pontoon bridge, and there will also be changing rooms, showers, and storage rooms on the riverbank. To ensure personnel safety, there will also be lifeguards patrolling at that time.

The reason why some areas of the Seine River will transform into public swimming pools has attracted widespread attention is largely because people have been looking forward to it for a century.

In many works of art, this world-renowned river is endowed with eternal and romantic colors. Playing on the beautiful Seine River must be very enjoyable.

However, due to the serious risks posed by boat traffic and rapid deterioration of water quality, playing in the Seine River has been officially prohibited since 1923. Nevertheless, it is reported that even until the early 1960s, there were still people who took risks and attempted.

Until the end of the 20th century, pollution became increasingly severe with urban development, and even those who dared to take risks began to hesitate. It is reported that Paris municipal officials often salvage rusty bicycles and other items from the Seine River. Bacteria have also been detected in the river water, and those who easily enter the water may even die from infection with leptospirosis.

Some comments suggest that not only swimmers, but the former Seine River was also too dirty for fish survival, so it was mainly used for boat navigation and even became a "garbage dump in the water".

Nevertheless, the dream of swimming along the Seine River has never been extinguished. In 1990, Jacques Chirac, who was then the mayor of Paris and later became the president of France, declared that three years later, "I will swim the Seine River in front of everyone to prove that it is a clean river." However, it turned out that the late president had broken his promise.

However, as Hidalgo said, the 2024 Paris Olympics will bring new opportunities. In 2016, Hidalgo reiterated his commitment during his bid for the Paris Olympics. Next July, swimming and other Olympic water events are expected to be held on the Seine River. At that time, the opening ceremony of the Summer Olympics will also be moved from the stadium to the Seine River, which will be the first time in history.

However, purifying the infamous Seine River to the point where people can swim is not an easy task. For this reason, Paris has invested 1.4 billion euros in the past seven years to comprehensively improve water quality. Specific measures include: connecting the sewage of approximately 23000 households along the coast to the sewage treatment system; Assist river vessels in improving their drainage systems through subsidy funds; Building large-scale facilities to store wastewater that needs to be treated; Build a new sewage treatment plant or carry out modernization renovation

Overall, these measures aim to treat urban production and domestic wastewater before discharge. On the riverbank, Paris has also launched a city wide tree planting plan, which opens up more open land to allow the urban soil to absorb more rainwater.

It is reported that most of the water purification work is expected to be completed this summer. The Paris authorities have stated that progress has been made in this costly project, and the Seine River has begun to recover. A test conducted last summer showed that the water quality of the Seine River has basically reached a safe level, especially with significantly controlled amounts of Escherichia coli and Enterococcus. The number of fish species in this river has also increased from 3 in the 1990s to 34 today.

However, the Paris authorities also stated that the water quality of the Seine River may decrease after heavy rainfall, but it is not expected to continue for too long, and the authorities will regularly check the water quality.

Widespread impact

However, the Seine River has once again transformed into a popular swimming pool after a hundred years, and there are still many challenges. According to reports, Paris opened swimming facilities along the Saint Martin Canal in 2017, which runs through the eastern part of Paris and then leads to the Seine River. But not long after, this facility was shut down after the bacteria rapidly proliferated. According to the Parisian newspaper, some local residents have expressed that in order to enter the Seine River, a leap in thought is needed.

But if the Seine River successfully transforms this time, it is expected to have a widespread impact. At the micro level, the Paris authorities hope to promote the Seine River to become the protagonist at the 2024 Paris Olympics by improving its water quality and leaving behind an important legacy - making the Seine River truly an eternal and romantic river.

At a macro level, the Paris authorities hope that as global warming intensifies, more mass swimming pools will make the French capital more livable and even inspire other cities to move towards a cleaner and greener future together.

"It can be said that this will cause waves around the world because many cities are paying attention to Paris," said Dan Angelescu, a scientist who focuses on the water quality of the Seine River. "This is the beginning of a movement. At least we hope so."