I Am Not Having Second Thoughts About Floating In The Polluted Trinity River

In this week's Fort Worth Weekly 2nd Thought Safety First article, guest opinionizer, Kendall McCook, opinionized about something about which I have long wondered why more people do not verbalize a similar opinion.

That being what the hell are people thinking going floating in the Trinity River, in summer, when it is hot, with that dirty water obviously being a breeding ground for who knows what?

I have also long wondered why we have never seen photos of the perpetrator of the Rockin' the River nonsense, J.D. Granger, and his girl friend, floating in the river, during one of the Rockin' the River Happy Hour Inner Tube Floats.

Mr. McCook makes a point that should seem obvious to everyone, that being if you want to have a Trinity River Vision should not the first thing that vision sees be a clean up of the river, making it safe, and clean, to play in?

Mr. McCook was inspired to verbalize his opinion after seeing the Amon Carter Museum's controversial Terry Allen photographic exhibit about the Trinity River as it sludges through Fort Worth.

Below is part of what Mr. McCook opined in Safety First, you can click the link to read his entire 2nd Thought....

I finally found the opportunity to visit the Amon Carter Museum of Modern Art and enjoy Terry Allen’s photographic exhibit, Meet Me at the Trinity. The impressive work, commissioned by the museum, represents a vision of a river long troubled by neglect and pollution but now suffering from too much of the wrong kind of attention, as illustrated by a photo of graffiti sprayed in black on a Trinity River stone abutment. The spray-painted words ask, “What does this have to do with nature?”

The river has become more a viaduct than a stream. Her waters seem murky and stagnant. One telling portrait shows a man and his teenage daughter floating in the flotsam on tubing day.

Most of Allen’s images capture the working poor and homeless who gather for refuge along the riverbanks. There are runners and walkers, bicyclists, and families reclining on 4th of July blankets surrounded by ice chests and picnic baskets and towels they barely use, for no one ventures into the Trinity for a casual swim. They all seem to somehow know better.

It is this issue of water quality that neither the Tarrant Regional Water District nor Trinity River Vision officials are willing to address. They go blithely about, completely ignoring the problem, although, according to Jeff Prince’s Oct. 9, 2013, Fort Worth Weekly article (“Does Untested = Clean?”), evidence indicates that there are real concerns. San Antonio River authorities provide weekly testing and public disclosure of the results,  while Trinity officials test only once a month and do not publish the results. Instead they provide a disclaimer for all tubers to sign, absolving the TRV from any responsibility for any possible disease acquired in the water.