Designing sports pools for swimming

Headfirst dive into swimming facility design: a semi-serious guide for designers who can’t swim.

When you think of the swimming pool, the first thing that comes to mind is a pool full of water, with lanes, flags (which don't cross the pool for show) and a few people swimming back and forth.
The pool is the hub of the activity for which the sports facility in question is intended, theyou use dominant unfolds right there, people go there specifically to swim. But it is not necessarily the pool and its specific plant system that is the main theme of the project development.
You have to put yourself in the user's shoes. Jokingly, it's very little, we're talking about swimsuits, even quite tight ones, plus a towel or bathrobe if you want to take a longer route. 

Jokes aside, we must consider an audience that, however varied, has specific needs, different from those of those who access the swimming pool of a hotel, or a water park, that is, pools not specifically dedicated to the teaching and practice of ARTISTIC and other even more specific sports activities such as water polo, fin swimming, swimming, dips and then water aerobics, hydrobike, aquafit cross, and everything the sports wellness industry has to offer in spades. 
In this regard, several examples of tanks are also available on Archweb Spas e Garden pools.
It cannot be said that every discipline needs its own pool, but it is quite clear that in one and a half meters of water swimming lessons are fine, while diving is best avoided.
Playing with words again, if class is not water, then water is not a class either, in the sense that it is not sufficient to define a single typology, neither of project, nor of user.
That would already be enough think about the swimmer (beginner or expert makes no big difference) to focus the project's attention outside the water. It is assumed that this is adequate in terms of temperature, recirculation, filtration, sanitization, etc. and that the tank has the right dimensions. There are specific standards, specialized companies and among the Archweb CAD drawings available for download are several ready-to-use examples.

The swimmer is the user of the swimming pool, he is demanding and with good reason.

It was said to focus on the public, on the pool customer, the person to whom the facility is primarily dedicated, the one who with his attendance, loyalty and payment keeps the sports facility alive and makes the investment profitable. Whether this is public or private makes little difference, because it is not just a question of a mere financial return, but of broader repercussions on the territory, on the health of the citizens and also of a certain induced effect.

What does a swimming pool customer do?

At least two or three times a week the swimmer arrives at the facility, has to park, log in, buy a ticket, take off his shoes and put on his slippers, have lockers available to store objects, go to the changing room, change, take a shower, wait for his shift to start, go to the pool deck, hang up his bathrobe, leave his slippers, get into the water, swim and then repeat everything in reverse, plus dry his hair. And if after all this he also found a bar where he could get some refreshments, he might even be happy.
Lots of stuff! Especially if you have some kind of disability, or have limited motor skills, even temporary ones, due for example to an accident, or to some joints that need rehabilitating. 

Usually, for obvious hygienic reasons, users access the pool area exclusively through the changing rooms, but this should not also apply to the staff (lifeguards, instructors, cleaning staff and when necessary healthcare personnel).
There should be as much as possible a certain distance between the internal area where you walk with your shoes (entrances, ticket office, shoe changing area, etc.), the first aid station, the changing rooms, the showers and the pool area. difference in temperature and humidity, especially in winter. Both should grow gradually as you work your way from the outside toward the heart of the plant.

Once the swimmer enters the water, he changes environment, he no longer has to deal with the "usual gravity", he puts his head down and also begins to breathe differently, he is almost in another world. The rest of the facility no longer interests him, with the same length of the pool (25 or 50 meters), width of the lane and quality of the water, almost almost one facility is as good as another. 
When he puts his shoes back on, the perception of the quality of the service received and for which he paid, will come above all from the staff (instructors first and foremost) and from everything in the facility that does not concern the pool itself, of which he will remember above all the temperature, the cleaning andsmell of water, characteristics that the designer has great difficulty controlling and which can vary from one day to the next.

It should not be forgotten that swimming is particularly suitable not only for the physical development of young people and the maintenance of adult fitness, but also for preventing and rehabilitating the most varied ailments, as well as for the physical activity of disabled people. In short, quite a few people start going to the pool because the doctor told them to. This is not a fact to be underestimated, it means that they don't go there very willingly.
Among those who go there because they have to, we must add a few children pushed by their parents (so they are a little more at peace at the seaside) and those who are lucky enough to be able to use the facility together with their schoolmates. Many swimming pools, especially in the morning, work with the schools in winter and with the summer centres during the summer months. For children and teenagers they are also excellent opportunities for socializing, which however does not happen so much in the water, but rather in all those accessory phases before and after swimming.

For all these reasons, the designer can and must control various aspects: the quality of spaces, The accesses, itineraries,internal air and sunshine. They all have a strong impact on the quality perceived by the customer.
Furthermore the ease of cleaning and control of public areas, the accessibility of the plant equipment and a functional rationality of the service areas will certainly be appreciated first by the plant staff, and consequently by the users and therefore by the management.

The pool is dangerous because you can drown. Definitely not. And those who swim don't think so.

Aside from illnesses and ailments, which could happen in any other sporting activity, swimming is a very safe activity, because it is practically free from any type of trauma. In addition, swimming is always always under supervision and the facility must provide first aid personnel and equipment. If we take away water polo and diving, which are specialized disciplines, in swimming there is never contact, you don't jump and you don't fall back to the ground, so ankles, knees and back have very little to fear.
The problems do not come from what happens inside the pool, but from what happens outside. In all swimming pools it is forbidden to run, on bathtub floor and locker room, because if things go well you slip, if things go worse you take off and then fall back, the surfaces are hard (almost always tiles) and if there are sharp edges, the damage can only be more serious.
The designer must pay attention to all this, not only in the choice of non-slip materials (which is the minimum, but sometimes there is simply too much water), but also in the design and arrangement of the elements and furnishings, In route diagram, in slopes for water flow, in short, everything that can reduce “path risks” at the source.

When you are in a pool swimming you don't live on water alone, you also need air.

As mentioned, the water in the tub has its own specific plant equipment and is subjected to precise daily checks, while the same cannot be said for the air in the pool area. 
Outdoors and in general during the summer the question does not arise, because even indoor pools should always be equipped with large openings. But when it is cold outside, everything is kept closed and the environment is heated, the air quality it can be affected, but usually less importance is given to it than to water. 
Even in this case it would be advisable to contact specialized companies in HAVC for swimming pools, because it is not just a matter of sizing the system based on a certain volume of air, the natural convective motions that vary during the day and the seasons must be considered, the continuous heat exchange with a large mass of water at a practically constant temperature, as well as its evaporation which includes disinfectant substances potentially irritating especially to the eyes, nose and throat.
Swimming, perhaps at a fast pace (without necessarily being athletes), together with several other people, in an environment where the air is too hot, humid and perhaps full of chlorine, means experiencing an unpleasant sensation of difficulty breathing and even getting out of the pool can present problems, because the heat exchange that the body has with the water is suddenly reduced.
Natural convection, air circulation, sunshine are elements that the architect can keep under control. And, as previously said, the user notices it, this is reflected in loyalty, the pleasure of going to the pool, the turnover, and everything that goes with it.

In the pool there are not only those who swim, there are other people, even outside the pool deck.

Leaving aside those who work there, we cannot ignore the fact that children arrive at the pool accompanied by parents and/or relatives and the issue does not end with parking. Swimming lessons are not long enough to allow companions to do many other things in the meantime, just a little quick shopping, if the supermarket is close by. In addition, especially the little ones need to be helped to change in the locker room. 
Wouldn't it be thought that at least the number of people who can fit in the "small pool" (i.e. children) should be doubled in relation to the size of the changing room? Maybe so. Giving the mother the chance to hang her coat somewhere before she dies from the equatorial climate would be very nice... she's the one who pays for her son. 

Of course, it is important to remember that there must be space in the changing rooms for the clothes of twice as many people as can enter the water: those of the current shift and those of the next.
The convenience of the locker room, the number of showers, the cleaning of the Toilet, the availability and safety of the hairdryer are among the things that determine the quality perceived by the user. To retain the customer who can choose between our system and another approximately equidistant, we must also play on these details in the design phase, because then the additions are clearly more difficult.
The rules provide guidance and minimum standards, but the user does not know the regulations and he certainly doesn't care that the rules are respected minimum provisions.

What do parents do while their children are in swimming lessons? They watch them. What do children in swimming lessons do while their parents watch them? They wave at them. Doing strokes and simultaneously waving at their mother, every stroke, of every length, for the whole lesson, is a very difficult exercise, in fact even the teacher gets bored and the progress of the little fish leaves a bit to be desired. Adults should be able to watch without being seen.
Romanesque church matronei? Peepholes and hidden cameras? Or false mirrors like in interrogation rooms? Exaggerations of course, but something can be invented. Just asking the problem is a great start to solving it.

The day of the final exam is a different matter entirely. Grandmothers, aunts and cousins ​​need the stands, at least as much as they do for local youth competitions.
Well yes! There are also sports groups, pre-agonists, masters and let's skip over the triathletes who also jump over long ditches.
There will never be the fans of a football stadium, but at least the paths and services dedicated to the stands must be well separated from those for access to the changing rooms. It may not be necessary to have a special ticket office, but the possibility of controlling access, the view of the staff on the stands and possibly being able to guarantee a minimum of order service would be something appreciated by the management responsible for the facility, which could also coincide with the client of the designer.
And what does the “fan” do when heats that don’t interest him that much are competing (basically those where his children don’t compete)? Here’s where the bar comes in handy too.

Cover image: Marcelo Uva on Unsplash
Other design references on sporteimpianti.it

Tags