Last week Swimmable Rivers was present at the Amsterdam International Waterweek (AIWW).
Together with Paul Kennouche from the city of Paris, Mariette van Empel form the Dutch Embassy of Paris, Tilly Stroo from Wavemakers United and Frodo van Oostveen from WorldWaternet we represented ‘reinventing the Seine’. An interesting and diverse topic about improving the Water quality in the Seine for the upcoming Olympic Games.
Paul Kennouche took the stage during the Integrated Leaders Forum and gave a pitch about how exactly the City of Paris is working on the water quality.
It all started for the Seine in 1988. For years it was prohibited to swim in the Seine. Jacques Chiraq the former President of France made a promise that the Seine will be swimmable again. He unfortunately couldn’t make it work.
More than 30 years later Paris got a new incentive to work on their river: The Olympic Games of 2024.
This time, the gravitas of the Olympic games set all the wheels in motion and the city of Paris started renovating the Seine. Their goal is to make the Seine swimmable again.
Swimmable not only for the Olympic Games but mostly for the public starting in 2025.
– The gravitas of the Olympic Games set all the wheels in motion.
Paul ended his pitch with a promise that the city of Paris will make it possible to swim in the Seine.
The story about the Seine shows us a perfect example of making a river swimmable again in a fairly short time.
It shows us that if there is a will, there is a way.
Thank you AIWW for having us and let’s build from here.
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