It is part of the “legacy” promised at the end of the 2024 Olympic Games: the town hall of Paris unveiled on Sunday the first bathing sites in the Seine for 2025, the result of the efforts of the State and the communities. to clean up the river.
Sunday morning, tourists strolling on the picturesque quays located between the right bank and Île Saint-Louis were able to witness an unusual spectacle: instead of river boats, canoes-kayaks and swimmers in the river.
Among them, two assistants to Anne Hidalgo, the socialist mayor of Paris present at this summer nautical base to announce the very first authorized bathing sites on the Seine in Île-de-France.
“Promise kept. We are swimming in the Seine today and this is only the beginning, ”said the mayor of the capital, who had made this commitment, made in 2016, a pillar of the candidacy file for the organization of the Olympic Games, obtained the following year.
A promise more than thirty years old, since at the turn of the 1990s, his predecessor Jacques Chirac, before being elected head of state, had already made it, promising to take a dip himself “in front of witnesses”.
If she did not wet the swimsuit, unlike her two assistants for Town Planning, Emmanuel Grégoire, and for Sports, Pierre Rabadan, Mme Hidalgo has pledged to immerse herself in the river “next year”, that of the Olympics.
In addition to the “Bras Marie”, located very close to the Town Hall, the banks of Grenelle (15e arrondissement) and Bercy (12e) will host equipped and secure bathing areas, indicates the town hall.
“The monitored bodies of water will be delimited by buoys and a pontoon to access them, with spaces for changing, showering and storing your belongings on the quays”, specifies the municipality.
Modulated navigation
To ensure the safety of swimmers, the various public (Haropa port authority, Voies navigables de France, police and regional prefectures) and private (bateaux-mouches, freight) involved are still working to restrict or even ban river navigation. near the sites, indicates the town hall.
Like Pont Marie, that of Grenelle will be built on an arm of the Seine, cut by the Ile aux Cygnes, at a place where the ballet of boats is less intense.
The third site, built under a footbridge crossing the river below the Bercy park, may require “additional protection” such as barriers, specifies AFP the entourage of Anne Hidalgo, even if the latter wishes the “fewer adjustments possible”.
Bathing in the Seine, which was already practiced under the Ancien Régime, was banned in Paris exactly a century ago (1923) by a prefectural decree, and a river brigade constantly patrols to prevent diving.
“For the moment, we cannot swim in the Seine without the authorizations”, recalled the first deputy Emmanuel Grégoire. “We have to wait a little longer. »
Or just after the Olympic Games, which will mark the reunion of swimming with the Seine: the triathlon and open water swimming events will start from the Alexandre-III bridge which connects the Grand Palais to the Invalides.
A concrete result of the “legacy” of the Olympic Games promised to the general public to generate support around the event. Since 2016, the State and local authorities in the Ile-de-France region have invested around 1.4 billion euros to make the Seine and the Marne rivers swimmable.
Several works to reduce wastewater spills into the river in the event of a storm, or to clean them, and thus ensure sufficient water quality with regard to European regulations, are close to completion.
Individual owners of homes with poor connections, in which sewage and river water are not separated, and those of barges must also undertake work for an evacuation that does not pollute the river.
The latest analyzes of the quality of the water with regard to the regulations, which focuses on two bacteria, Escherichia coli and enterococci, attest to “sufficient” or “excellent” levels in dry weather, assures the town hall.
As for waste, particularly plastic, a call was recently launched to find the most appropriate technological innovation to collect it from the river.