www.swimmingpoolnews.co.uk
WorldNews OCT 2010 SPN
ASTRALPOOL INSTALLS SPAIN’S LARGEST POOL WITH A MOVING FLOOR
AstralPool has installed the biggest pool ever seen in Spain with a moving floor. The Olympic sized pool is at the new outdoor swimming facilities in Sabadell, Barcelona. One point six million euros was invested in the construction of the pool. The flexibility of the floor allows several swimming activities to be carried out at the same time. Fluidra Spain, the Spanish subsidiary of the Fluidra Group, was in charge of planning and installing the pool – currently the biggest in Spain, and one of the biggest in Europe, with a moving floor and wall. The moving floor is 25 metres long and 12.5 metres wide, thereby constituting 312 m2 of pool surface that is submerged at the bottom of the pool. The platform moves upwards, which makes it possible to
GLASS POOL WALLS ARE THE NEW DESIGN ‘MUST HAVES’
There’s a new craze in and around Australian swimming pools – glass pool walls. Glass walls surrounding pools are also growing in popularity in Australia and have been praised as being both attractive and fitting in with the new tough safety laws around swimming pools. The walls are not cheap but have hit the ‘latest craze’ button of many up market pool owners. “Large-scale, frameless, glass pool walls are at the top end of the affordability scale,” said Vince Bianchini with Cooling Brothers. A typical glass wall around a pool has four panels approximately 2,000mm high by 2,500mm long constructed of 32- mm tempered, laminated glass with polished edges.
81 IN BRIEF
XXXXX XXXXX Xxxxxx xxxxx
NEW PACIFIC TRADE SHOW LAUNCHED FOR 2011
change the depth of the pool. This means it is able to go from 2 to 0 metres in depth, thus creating areas of varying depth.
In pools that have a moving floor, there is normally a shallower area with a depth of approximately 1.20 metres, where users can perform activities in which they
must be able to stand in the water, such as aqua gym, aqua aerobics and children’s swimming activities. In the rest of the space, the maximum depth of 2 metres is maintained to allow users to carry out swimming activities such as training, scuba diving and synchronised swimming.
NEGATIVE MEDIA HITS TRADE PROGRESS HARD
A wave of negative press and media attacks on the specialist pool industry in the United States has set recovery back, many observers believe. The battle over terms in the Virginia Graeme Baker Pool and Spa Safety Act, as well as two high profile tragic drownings, has spurred a wave of negative press. In early August, a syndicated article featured the parents of two entrapment victims who stated that the industry was working to weaken the VGB Act. Shortly afterward, Consumer Reports posted a blog stating that backup devices such as safety vacuum release systems should be required on all pools with single drains, even if that drain is considered unblockable. Then the Boston Globe published an article saying that, amid safety concerns, the prospect of pool ownership is losing its appeal. It stated that most young parents won’t consider a house if it has a pool, and many current owners are opting to remove their pools. The piece came after the area was devastated by the drowning deaths of two sets of toddler twin girls – one two years old and the other four – in separate incidents, both occurred in Massachusetts.
In the article, Nancy Baker, mother of Virginia Graeme Baker, and Karen Cohn, mother of Zachary Archer Cohn, discussed their drowning prevention advocacy. Baker was a prime force behind VGB’s passage. Cohn, along with her husband, formed the ZAC Foundation (named using their son’s initials), which is devoted to pool safety.
In March, the Consumer Product Safety Commission voted to classify certain drains as unblockable regardless of sump size. A pool with an unblockable drain is not required to have a backup device such a safety vacuum release system.
“The laws are trying to be rolled back by the pool industry,” Cohn said, “and we really want to make sure that we’re here to protect the children.” They also worry about the impact the negative press has on the image of pools and spas. “It proliferates doom and gloom about pool ownership. Some wonder if the industry is doing enough to promote pool and spa benefits,” he added.
SPLASH! Asia is a new addition to the world’s specialist pool and spa exhibitions. SPLASH! Asia will make its debut in Singapore from 4-5 May next year. It is expected to attract about 40 to 50 exhibitors and approximately 800 to 1000 attendees. One of the key draws will be the popular educational seminar
programme with international speakers from America and Australia. SPLASH! Asia will be a sister exhibition to the successful exhibitions held in Australia and New Zealand and is seen as a further sign of the fast expansion of the Pacific marketplace for pools and hot tubs.
GOOGLE EARTH TRACKS DOWN OFFENDING POOL OWNERS
Google Street View has been used in the United States to prosecute 250 home owners who have built their swimming pools without proper permits. The innovative approach to use Google’s ‘eye in the sky’ to track down offending home owners was the idea of lawyers in Riverhead, New York.
The use of Google in such a way has sparked off privacy rights in the United States but local officials say it was a reasonable and fair way to track down homes with swimming pools and check them against those who had formally applied for the legal planning and building regulations.
Google Earth images identified about 250 homes where residents failed to get building permits certifying their swimming pools complied with safety regulations.
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91