This article was written for CityChangers.org by Laura Puttkamer, a writer, journalist, communications consultant, and founder of parCitypatory. In it, she explains how a lack of inclusive infrastructure is a barrier to independent recreational and wild swimming for people living with disabilities and anyone who feels insecure in their physical strength and stability. Laura also shares the advice of volunteer organisation WeSwim for how cities can build more accessible opportunities for public bathing.
Many cities proudly promote swimming as one of the healthiest, most affordable forms of exercise – civic good offered through a network of public pools, lidos and, increasingly, managed outdoor bathing sites. Yet for disabled people, these facilities remain effectively unusable. In London, where the disability employment gap and social isolation rates remain among the highest in the country, access to water is not just a recreational issue but a question of health equity, mobility, and dignity.
For Tash Fleming, founder of the London-based charity WeSwim, the problem sits not with swimmers but with cities. “It’s the environment that is the barrier for people with disabilities. It’s not their disability. It’s that we as society have not provided a solution that works for them.”
One of the swimmers her organisation works with, Paresh, explains: “I’ve been visually impaired from birth and can only make out some shapes and colours. I always tried to learn how to swim, but there was nobody to teach me on a one-to-one basis in the pool. I can’t see what swimming instructors are demonstrating, so I lost confidence.”
The volunteers from WeSwim are giving him an opportunity now to learn a new skill: “WeSwim assigned a volunteer to me who showed me exactly where the hangers are in the changing rooms, where the bench is and whether it’s clean, where the steps are in the pool, and what size and depth the pool has,” Paresh says. Every Monday, a volunteer asks his consent to assist with hands-on movement and breathing technique demonstrations, slowly improving his confidence in the water.
In different London pools, the organisation hosts regular sessions where volunteers offer 1:1 support to swimmers or learners with accessibility needs. Tash, who used to volunteer for the Pimlico Puffins Swimming Club, is passionate about supporting disability swimming in London. Funding has enabled her to start her own NGO and convince London pools to host WeSwim sessions. Around 180 volunteers, often from the local area, give their time to support the project. Each session finishes with a biscuit and some time to chat. “Hopefully one day, I will be able to swim like everybody else”, Paresh says.
Pools as Part of the Civic Infrastructure
The challenges begin long before anyone reaches the water. Tash has spent over a decade volunteering in and analysing London pools, and says the barriers are overwhelmingly systemic.
Activity Alliance research has shown that the biggest obstacles are psychological safety and fear of judgement. Tash sees this constantly. “People not feeling safe… people feeling very much judged by the general public, being stared at, and not feeling comfortable conforming to lane swimming.”
Most public pools prioritise lane swimming, a model that rewards competence, speed and predictability. But for many disabled swimmers, the therapeutic value of water has nothing to do with laps. “A lot of the benefits people get are not from traditional swimming,” she explains. “They’re from doing stretches and walking in the water… and that doesn’t work with lane swimming.”
But urban pools are not just physical structures, they are social places where self-confidence, community, and identity take shape. For many disabled people, meaningful participation requires more than accessibility technology; it needs human support. Tash’s NGO WeSwim offers one-to-one assistance for around 70% of its swimmers. For volunteers and swimmers alike, these moments can be transformative. She recalls swimming with a young man with learning disabilities: “During that one hour, I saw him improve and have the confidence to put his head a bit further back… It’s a really magical moment.”
Loneliness is deeply entwined with disability in cities. WeSwim’s regular sessions have become a social anchor. “A lot of our swimmers call it their swimming family.” Urban planners increasingly recognise the importance of social infrastructure – libraries, youth centres, community cafés. Tash argues that accessible swimming should be considered part of that same civic toolkit.
Designing Pools That Work for Everyone
Urban planners often assume accessibility is a matter of wheelchairs and hoists, but the details reveal more complex shortcomings in the physical infrastructure of pools.
Designing better pools starts with changing rooms that reflect modern needs: gendered changing rooms are still the norm, despite urban populations becoming more diverse. Individual cubicles in a mixed “changing village” offer far more flexibility and include non-binary persons.
Paresh adds that lockers are something to consider: “Designated lockers next to the disabled changing rooms are a big thing, but only some pools and gyms have them. They should be easy to find and access.” He also points out that tactile edges around the pool and colour contrasts are important, as is information about the size and depth of the pool.
The next step is the entrance into the water, which should enable independent access. Some newer pools boast hoists yet hide them away. “Some places have hoists, but they don’t have them out all the time because it’s not neat and tidy. If you don’t see it out, you don’t feel you can use it, and you have to ask permission… which is just not accessible,” Tash explains.
At other pools, ramps are built on steep cambers, making independent access impossible. One site she works with fitted an audible alarm to the hoist, ostensibly for safety, but it has the opposite effect: “My swimmers say it’s so embarrassing because it announces something like, ‘disabled person entering the water’. It puts people off.”
Traditional vertical ladders are standard across Britain, despite being unusable for many older or less mobile residents. “Wide graduated steps would be better for everyone,” Tash says. Even her 89-year-old grandmother, she notes, “wouldn’t consider herself disabled, but she couldn’t use a ladder, and she wouldn’t go in a hoist.”
Urban Outdoor Swimming: A Growing Movement with Familiar Barriers
Lidos, park ponds, and rivers are booming as urban amenities, but their accessibility remains neglected. Outdoor facilities commonly rely on simple matting, which becomes unstable, slippery, or unusable for anyone without perfect balance. “A lot of outdoor sites have matting to get in that’s often quite steep and a bit of a trip hazard. If someone just put in some accessible facilities, that would improve it,” according to Tash.
A discussion on the Facebook page of London’s Kenwood Ladies Pond suggests that handrails in showers, better grip on ladder handrails, and wide steps would drastically improve accessibility. In addition, group members agree that guide dogs and emotional support dogs should be allowed in the outdoor swimming area.
Cold-water temperature – something no planner can change – is another major limitation to outdoor swimming. Many of the swimmers WeSwim supports simply cannot tolerate it long enough to benefit. However, induction courses by volunteers and simple measures like hot showers could help making this particular kind of swimming more accessible to those who can bear the lower temperatures.
What Cities Can Do to Make Swimming More Accessible
Cities don’t need multimillion-pound refurbishments to make meaningful progress. Many changes are simple, inexpensive, and immediately impactful. Tash shares the following recommendations that tackle both the physical and the social aspect of swimming:
- Publish clear information
“Advertising what facilities there are, for example the types of changing rooms, hoists, entry option, helps people plan and reduces anxiety,” Tash says. - Keep hoists visible and ready
A hoist stored in a cupboard may as well not exist. - Provide wide graduated steps as standard
This is universal design: good for disabled swimmers, older residents, pregnant swimmers, and anyone nervous in water. - Train staff for confidence, not compliance
Paresh says that his favourite gym has offered visual awareness training to staff members. “A lot of it is around attitudes… By normalising it, it gives the leisure team the confidence to offer help.” - Stop scheduling disability sessions at unusable times
Tash: “Some sessions are at 2pm, which just doesn’t work for disabled people who are in employment.” - Include disabled residents in planning from day one
Not after the building is complete, when change becomes expensive and contentious.
Treating Pools as Part of the Social Infrastructure
In many cities, swimming’s popularity is surging, for reasons like fitness, mental health, and climate resilience. But without accessible design, disabled residents remain locked out of a public good that should belong to them as much as anyone else.
“We work with every individual on what they want to do, including exercises, swimming, water confidence, fitness, mental health, just floating.” Tash says. “We’ve built a community because people feel safe.” While not every city or borough has enough volunteers to enable 1:1 support like WeSwim does, it is a good idea to work on confidence-building and provide guided sessions that are truly accessible.
If cities truly want to build healthier, more equitable places, they must start treating water not as a luxury amenity, nor as a narrow lane-swimming asset, but as social infrastructure: something that works only when everyone can get in.
Laura regularly shares articles covering different themes in urban sustainability – from Milan’s Olympic legacy to community saunas as emerging third spaces – on her Urban Solutions Journalism Substack channel.