[SamAdams76]

The old-style "drowning pools" won't be missed, aquatics expert Tom Griffiths said.

This nitwit ought to speak for himself and not for others. Some of my fondest childhood memories was when I became a good enough swimmer to go to the "deep end" of the pool. I eventually became very comfortable in water over my head. As a result, it would be very difficult to drown me as I can even today tread water or float for hours on end. During my trip to Alabama last week, I took my son to the municipal pool in Douglas (where I went as a child) and they still had a 15ft deep end. My 12-year-old son and I spent several hours out there.

Ironically, this trend towards shallow pools will probably increase drownings in the long run as kids will grow up afraid to be in water over their heads and will be more likely to drown if ever they find themselves in a situation where they are.

[motor_racer]

The Liberal cry: Just Say NO to FUN!! Remember, fun can kill! Circle/slash fun, etc.

Stay home, wring your hands, bitch and moan about Republicans. Fun takes your eyes off the prize!

Lord help us.

[budwiesest]

Lawyers and insurance companies. Meet the enemy of yesterday and the sculptors of tomorrow.

Like chrome bumpers and fins, the deep end will be deep-sixed. Small children drown in 5 gallon buckets, by tipping over into a few inches of water.

Unfortunately, backyard pools with diving boards were often built in such a way that someone with a lot of 'spring' could easily come in contact with the 'hopper' (where the deep end slopes up to the shallow end). Eight feet was the minimun depth for pools with a board.

[csvset]

Man, the namby-pamby squad has set their sights on the swimming pools! We taught our three kids to swim when they were babies.

When they were older, they couldn't go into the deep end or off the slide or diving board at the club pool until they demonstrated to the lifeguards that they could swim the length of the pool in addition to swimming from side to side underwater.

Talk about motivation! Kids don't want to be left out, so they practiced until they could do it and bang, they were off to the deep end.

I worry about the sissifacation of the nation's youth.

[lawgirl]

Another tribute to the American trial lawyers. Thanks for nothing.

[The Brush]

When I was a kid the pool had a deep end, the playground had a slide with two bars instead of a seat to sit on.
We played "army" with realistic looking guns in the park bushes, got into fights without our parents becoming involved, cigarettes cost $.35 a pack and you didn't need an I.D.

Of course I recently learned that the current president back then was doing some young woman too.
Some things never change.

[armymarinemom]

Too many children drown unattended in bath tubs. From now on all homes should have the removed!!

[Prodigal Son]

Tell me this isn't the Onion. Every time I get the wife worked up to finally escape the Big Brother oppression of Europe and move to the States, some article like this surfaces and she gets scared off...

[solitas]

They can have my diving board when they pry it from my cold, dead...

[Centurion2000]

So basically it becomes a giant public wading pool for kids to pee in.

[Citizen of the Savage Nation]

A sad trend, for me. What's wrong with having to actually learn to swim? Oh, the horror.

I noticed this happening in Las Vegas throughout the '90s, all of the new strip hotels featured waste deep pools where you were lucky to get 4 ft. When I was growing up, we called them 'kiddie pools'.

Moral of the story, build your own or go abroad. Switzerland has some awesome public swimming pools (indoors which means they're 365-available, warm water, and plenty of good diving area). The city I live in spent millions on a 4-pool public facility, very nice. But the forgot the 4 walls and a roof that would make them useful more than the 3 months of swimmable weather we get around here...

[Jhoffa_]

This is pointless.

How can anyone enjoy a shallow swimming pool?

4' deep water get's booring in a big hurry.

[Intolerant in NJ]

...The old-style "drowning pools" won't be missed, aquatics expert Tom Griffiths said...funny - the only story I remember about someone drowning in a Philly public pool recently was a year or so ago when a child lost her life because the two lifeguards who were supposed to be protecting her were off somewhere together smoking pot...hardly the pool's fault......

[Spok]

In a time when we have so much to fear that is real, why do we choose our own shadows?

[aruanan]

...but then they were left with a drowning pool. Children were sliding down that slope into the deep end," Griffiths said.

Griffiths said it was a "great, great idea" to fill pools in. "A typical diving well-type pool is a dinosaur."

Isn't there some big drowning pool where we can take all the safety Nazis like Griffiths?

[potlatch]

Pretty soon they are going to wrap us in cotton at birth, put us in a 'pod' and hand feed us the rest of our lives so no misfortune can befall us!!!

[PatrioticAmerican]

Next, blue painted rubber to look like a pool, and kids, dressed in blow-up safety devices and sprayed with a fine mist of water, will "play" and "have fun" as though they actually were in a pool.

This is a nation of sissies. Even Mexico is kicking our ass.

[FLAMING DEATH]

This is a step in the right direction. Next, we need to start filling in all lakes and rivers to a depth of four feet. When that's finished, we can start on the oceans.

[spunkets]

"fearing safety hazard"

That's the key in all this ninny-nanny stuff. They want you to fear it, not handle it w/o disaster.

[LibWhacker]

Here 'ya go, America. The nanny state will take care of 'ya.