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THE POST | News | Sports | Culture | Business | Free Forum
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| Philadelphia Swimming Pools Crowding |
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 by: Rebel - Havertown, PA
started: 07/21/11 11:49 am | updated: 07/21/11 11:49 am |
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Hot and humid weather's keeping the city swimming pools busy. Overcrowding is now the problem. At Hunting Park Pool, only 240 people can swim at a time... 30 swimmers for each of eight lifeguards.
The staff has them swimming in shifts. They let people swim for 30 minutes, blow a whistle, tell them to get out of the pool, and let the next group in.
Philadelphia police are detailed to 47 pools daily to help staffers deal with uncooperative teenagers and other challenges; 33 other pools receive at least some police presence.
On the hottest days, as many as 1,000 people come to some city pools, with the Kelly Pool in West Philadelphia among the most popular.
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Barry Salow, who works for the city's Parks and Recreation Department, said, "I'm ultra-worried about Thursday and Friday," when the temperature is forecast to reach or surpass 100.
The pool can let only 240 people swim at a time - 30 swimmers for each of eight lifeguards.
"The problem is what happens when we have 200 people waiting outside," said Salow.
This year, he has more help with crowd control. Philadelphia police are detailed to 47 pools daily to help staffers deal with uncooperative teenagers and other challenges; 33 other pools receive at least some police presence.
"The police have been a big help," Salow said. Last year, people repeatedly cut down the fence surrounding the pool at night. That hasn't happened this year, and Salow thinks it's because the police have stepped up their patrols.
"We let the people with the dry suits in and get the wet suits out of the way," Salow explained.
Elizabeth Haynesworth, who visits the pool daily with her two children, said she thinks the police are necessary. "They have to have them because a lot of people don't listen to the lifeguards," she said.
Leo Dignam, deputy commissioner of the Parks and Recreation Department, said the city has stationed police at pools since 2009.
"Sometimes people aren't too happy about getting out of the pool, especially teenagers," Dignam said. "They'd start diving in. We'd have to start calling 911. A lot of times just the sight of the police creates a little bit more cooperative atmosphere."
Although one teenager leaving the Vogt parking lot muttered that the staff was too uptight, most swimmers said they thought the rules - no flotation devices allowed; swimmers must wear bathing suits, not street clothes - helped keep everyone safe.
"It's the best pool in town. It's pretty well-mixed [racially]. Everybody gets along here," said Kenny Olberholtzer, 45, a Tacony plumber who was splashing in the Vogt Pool with daughters Megan, 11, and Allison, 5.
With water dripping from her hair and swimsuit, 10-year-old Cathy Julia volunteered that her favorite part of the pool was not the cool water.
"What I like about this pool is that it's safe here," she said. "The cops come here and they take care of us."
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