A +Pool in the East River • Hacker News Board

Re: A +Pool in the East River

#31

Post by SeoxyS » Fri, Aug 01, 2014, 1:35 AM UTC

rsync wrote: post #16

This exists already in Zurich. Sort of. There is a river (a very clean river, of course) that flows through Zurich, and there is a 200 foot or so length of the river that is buoyed/strung off to form a decent sized "pool". You go downstream, jump in, and swim upstream. You're swimming in the actual river, just inside a marked off area with a nice deck on one side. It's really quite well done. Here it is: http://www.z…

In Bern, there's a "pool" I used to love going to. It's got normal pools, but there's also the opportunity to jump into the river, where the currents will easily carry you half a mile in no time.

http://www.bern.com/en/activities/adventure-fun/river-swim/m...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Dc1vmzjwJE

Re: A +Pool in the East River

#32

Post by thinkalone » Fri, Aug 01, 2014, 2:21 AM UTC

munificent wrote: post #27

Is it just me, or is this a completely stupid idea? So you take a big pool and stick it in the middle of a dirty river. You need it to be full of water, so you filter a bunch of river water and fill it up. Then, for no good reason I can discern, you take that nicely filtered water and dump it right back into the river so that you can make room for more water that you then have to filter. What is the value add of cont…

Their intention is for the pool to act as a filter to clean NYC's waterways[1]. Research into effective water filters could be worthwhile, but the floating pool seems to overshadow that aspect.

[1]: http://www.pluspool.org/about/

Re: A +Pool in the East River

#33

Post by brandonmenc » Fri, Aug 01, 2014, 2:48 AM UTC

"Technically, Norfolk has more gross tonnage."

Re: A +Pool in the East River

#34

Post by tnorthcutt » Fri, Aug 01, 2014, 4:26 AM UTC

spott wrote: post #7

FatalLogic wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/694835844/pool-a-floati...

The article says they raised $300k, but this kickstarter only says $50k. Any ideas where the discrepancy comes from?

That was the first kickstarter; they then ran a second one for the next phase of the project: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/694835844/pool-tile-by-...

Re: A +Pool in the East River

#35

Post by gioele » Fri, Aug 01, 2014, 5:45 AM UTC

Zikes wrote: post #4

Off-topic, but why do traditional print companies always stubbornly insist on ignoring the fundamental differences between print and web media? All that text, and not a single link to the +Pool Kickstarter page. It doesn't even have to be in the article text itself, having it at the end would be just fine.

Not referencing sources is bad even for classic non-hypertextual media.

Re: A +Pool in the East River

#36

Post by Mithaldu » Fri, Aug 01, 2014, 6:34 AM UTC

Mithaldu wrote: post #15

Zikes wrote: post #4

Off-topic, but why do traditional print companies always stubbornly insist on ignoring the fundamental differences between print and web media? All that text, and not a single link to the +Pool Kickstarter page. It doesn't even have to be in the article text itself, having it at the end would be just fine.

I asked the author on twitter, maybe he'll answer. :) https://twitter.com/mithaldu/status/494940364717842434

Turns out it's simply a direct copy of a print article, which of course doesn't have links.

Re: A +Pool in the East River

#37

Post by 0x006A » Fri, Aug 01, 2014, 8:08 AM UTC

Berlin has a floating pool build from an old ship. https://www.google.com/search?q=ARENA+BADESCHIFF&tbm=isch

Re: A +Pool in the East River

#38

Post by readerrrr » Fri, Aug 01, 2014, 8:16 AM UTC

a8da6b0c91d wrote: post #25

readerrrr wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure you can do that, for safety( and it is really easy ). But I think the larger goal here is to develop methods for filtration; it doesn't use electricity, machinery and uses local water. I think this is the best example of what a project on kickstarter is supposed to be.

You'd still need chlorine to keep the swimmers' bodies from fouling up the water, unless you're substantially refilling continuously.

Read the parent post of my comment.

Re: A +Pool in the East River

#39

Post by sireat » Fri, Aug 01, 2014, 11:32 AM UTC

Actually, I know that a similar idea has been used before in late 19th century, earlier in the 20th century, except it was much cruder. Basically a section of the river was marked off by nets and people could swim in them. I know some resorts still use a similar method, but again the filtering is only for very large particles.

The hard part is the filtering. Developing an effective filtering method for such a large body of water would be an impressive achievement.