Vannie pool: an oasis in the hot city

All 4-year-old Desire Rodriguez wants to do is lose her fear of the water. 

“I just want to make it so she is not afraid, so she can learn how to swim,” said Desire’s aunt Jasmine.

The Rodriguez family has frequented the Van Cortlandt Park swimming pool at least twice a week for the past 11 years. 

Desire and her aunt have spent more than one Saturday in Van Cortlandt’s waters this summer trying to overcome the child’s timidity. The two were surrounded by the nearly 800 swimmers, splashers, toe-dippers and belly-floppers that fill the main wading pools on hot summer days. The bathers’ personal droplets lead to a communal cistern of memories — some athletic, others goofy, most sun-drenched and buoyant. 

The same complexities can be attributed to the pool itself. 

Few spots in the city are imbued with a history that is so kaleidoscopic. And few fly — or rather swim — in the face of such an unfair reputation, as does the borough in which it rests. 

Backyard pool

For more than 40 years, Van Cortlandt Park has offered two swimming pools — a large main pool, 164 feet long, 104 feet wide and 3.5 feet deep, as well as a 48-by-48 foot wading or “kiddie” pool, 1-foot deep. 

The pools have a formidable capacity. On opening day this year, they hosted 1,500 visitors, according to manager Kathleen Walker. There are 15 lifeguards and six security guards, she said. 

Both pools opened to the public on Aug. 21, 1970. Van Cortlandt was the largest of a series of swimming complexes across the city that were conceived during the administration of Mayor John Lindsay. 

Van Cortlandt Park’s pools cost $1.6 million to build, including a sundeck, a concession area, bathhouses, dressing rooms, restrooms and a first aid room. 

The complex initially had a diving pool, which was closed in 1979, when it was discovered it had a crack in its basin. It has never reopened and the area has since been converted into a pair of outdoor volleyball courts.