by elizabeth | August 9th, 2010
Special edition, in which our heroine swims in a dumpster!
As part of NYC’s Summer Streets program, Park Avenue is closed off on three Saturdays in August, and features bike riding, concerts, and most importantly… pools made of dumpsters! I couldn’t miss it, so my sweetie and I got up super early Saturday to make sure we got a slot. We arrived around 7:15am, and were the 20th and 21st people in line, so we got to swim during the first time slot!
The dumpsters are brand-new, and have been converted into pools according to city specifications (decks, filtration systems, etc.). I think I would have liked it more had they been used dumpsters, but nobody asked me!
It turns out that a dumpster is very small! The width of the pool is about the length of my body, and if more than one or two people are in the pool, mobility is limited. But at the end of the session, I got the pool all to myself, and leaped in. Turns out, the rule is no jumping as well as no diving. I kind of hurt my butt, so I guess the rule makes sense. [Insert sheepish look here.]
Ben Aaron of NBC News was reporting from inside the pool….
…and you can see us at about 1:10 in the video from the NBC website.
You’ve got two more Saturdays to experience the dumpster diving experience (just remember, no diving!) right at Grand Central Station!
STATUS: 8 pools plus 1 dumpster down, 29 to go
Will you teach me to float on my back?
Rothkoesque: little quadrangle of sparkly blue surrounded by steel-gray pavement and shiny chrome, orange vibrating stripe across center, topped with Grand Central chromatics — great photography and excellent use of a dumpster!