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August 9, 2004
Americans demand more pools
The Times offered an article this weekend that is pleasantly synchronous with my own life: Americans are building more pools. The pool industry has grown 5-6% per year since 1998; people want pools for non joint-stressing exercise, to increase the value of their homes, or because they're sick of taking care of their lawns. As you might expect, most of the homeowners and industry people featured in the article live in places like San Diego, Houston, and Miami, but one quote about the popularity of pools comes from the president of a pool company in Norwalk, Connecticut. Even in frosty New England, people love their pools--in fact, this weekend I noticed more backyard pools than ever during a visit to suburban CT. In these kinds of regions, where the price of land is incredibly high, the summers are short, and you can get to the ocean in a 10 minute drive, why would so many people want their own pool? Sure, everybody in L.A. has a pool, but in the suburbs of New Haven? Are pools mainly an emblem of middle-class success, even more meaningful in regions where they can only be used for a quarter of the year?
I don't know, but there are other things about suburban New England that I also don't understand, like when white Republican businessmen wear FUBU bathing trunks while swimming in their above-ground status-symbol pools.
