Swimming
In Berlin, they plunge into spree to challenge a century of ban
Hundreds of Berliners participated in an aquatic demonstration in the heart of the German capital. They demanded the end of a ban dating from 1925.
People swim in the Spree river in Berlin to protest against the ban on swimming, in force since 1925.
AP PHOTO/EBRAHIM NOROOZI
Hundreds of people are waiting in a swimsuit, a few meters from the historic avenue of Berlin: they threw themselves into the Spree Tuesday to ask for the end of a century of ban on swimming in this river.
Imaging yourself in front of the museum island, classified at Unesco, the cathedral and the TV tower in the background, in the channeled arm of the river is a “magnificent” experience, said Alisan Yasar to AFP. This 28 -year -old lawyer, who had “in the head, as Berlinois, that we are not going in the Spree”, wanted to “fight a lot of prejudices”.
On this hot summer day, the bathers responded – legally, the demonstration having obtained an exemption – from the call of the Flussbad association, which claims the end of the ban on swimming in the center of Berlin.
Centenary ban
If in its suburbs, the German capital is full of lakes and rivers which make it a nautical paradise, the spree as such remains prohibited for swimming since 1925, or pile a century. But “it is getting hotter and warmer” and it is therefore necessary “more public places to swim for free in the city”, estimates Oskar, a participant who says he is “jealous of cities” already with such places.
This is now the case of Paris, since the opening in early July of three swimming sites, including one near the Eiffel Tower, which have already welcomed tens of thousands of people.
The 2024 Olympic Games, with several disputed events in the Seinehad led the authorities to redouble ways to depolluate the river, with wastewater capture work to prevent them from spilling it.
“Sufficient” water in the spree
In Berlin, the initiative, launched in the early 2010s, faced delays and disagreements on the necessary infrastructure. Closed to river navigation, the “Spree Canal” was a popular swimming place at the beginning of the 20th century before the municipal authorities prohibited this practice, affirming that pollution due to the expansion of the metropolis made water too dirty.
“We measure water” whose quality “is good”, assures Katrin Androschin, a Flussbad official. The quality of the water is insufficient “only a few days a year”, according to her.
Elsewhere in Germany, certain parts of the Isar river in Munich have been arranged for swimming, allowed once the wastewater of the city disinfected with UV radiation. However, several cities in western Germany plan to ban swimming in the Rhine after several cases of drownings.
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