Taking the “Dotondori Dive*” has been a long tradition for drunk Osaka revelers who jump off the bridges over the Dotonbori Canal into the toxic sludge. Over the years, many crazies have died doing the Dive. Now safety nets, fences and warning signs are erected in the most dangerous areas.
Soon however, sewer swimming with be a tourist attraction for Osaka’s Dotonbori district.
Today’s Sankei Shimbun/newspaper (in Japanese) is reporting that the fun folks in the city of Osaka are planning a “Dive Dotonbori” swimming area.
According to Sankei Shimbun, local merchants are planing to create a “Pool Dotonbori” for swimming in the poisonous, slime-filled, Dotonbori Canal. They will line part of the foul canal with a hi-tech waterproof fabric and then fill that section of the canal with city tap water to create a swimming area that will be 1 km long and 12 to 14 meters wide.
When the new Dotonbori swimming area is competed, Osaka will hold world-class long-distance swimming competition to commemorate the opening of the canal to the public. The swimming area even plans to have designated diving spots so the crazies can safely enjoy their drunk dives. The fee for swimming will be 2,000 yen ($24 USD) for two hours and there are plans for commercial sponsors and advertising for sewer swimming.
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Additional photos of Dotonbori Driving into sludge.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dotonbori
Hey, isn’t that Toxie in the middle of Dotonburi Bridge?
What the f…………..
The whole point (allure/popularity) of diving there was because it was spontaneous, which added to the party atmosphere. When Hanshin won the championship or whatever…… Leave it to the Japanese to sanitize everything and anything. Now they want to create a sanitized sewer. Now that’s the height of irony! What’s next? Paper towels to sanitize toilet paper?
This planned pool will fail horribly and then become a squeaky clean empty shrine to all forever alones throughout the universe.
Good eye!
That’s nuts.
If they think they’re so brave, let’s see ‘em dive/swim off the coast of Fukushima.
Every year we hear about kids that drown in a pool which makes pool safety fences even more important. Osaka better have properly-designed pool safety fences that can handle all the drunk jumpers they are going to have.
Seems like just another case of sanitizing away the grubby charm of Osaka in a long line of attempts to clean up the place and turn it into just another sterile, characterless J city.
Osaka ought to go upscale in Dotonbori’s sewer swimming and change the iconic ↑ Glico Runner on the canal with this by Black Rhombie…
gramfeed.com/blackrhombi
Osaka’s failed Dotonbori sewer swimming plans are “inhanced” by changes to the iconic Glico Runner on the canal (sewer)…
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Glico unveils new lame runner billboard
Kyodo News International October 23, 2014 (GlobalPost)
…Instead of neon bulbs, the sixth Glico runner billboard since 1935 employs around 140,000 boring energy-efficient LEDs…continues…
On the Dotonbori Sewer Canal for the next three days, huge toxic sushi were floated as part of the art event “Osaka Canvas 2015″.