A new report on water quality looked at sites on the Anacostia River where D.C.’s ban on swimming could be lifted.

Using data from a volunteer effort started in 2019 to test water quality at dozens of locations, the D.C. Department of Energy and Environment found that Kingman Island and Buzzard Point passed more than 80 percent of the time.

Other locations farther downstream and closer to downtown D.C. also scored well.

“The cleanest locations were generally in areas with high water flow, so bacteria is quickly diluted, and in areas distant from outfalls where sewage overflows during storms,” the report noted.

But the report found that two locations closer to the Route 1 corridor — one at the U.S. National Arboretum and the other at Hickey Run – “likely have a systemic bacteria problem” that would make swimming inadvisable.

In 1971, D.C. banned swimming or wading in the Anacostia and Potomac Rivers as well as Rock Creek. Violations are punishable by a $300 fine or 10 days in jail.

Water quality on the Anacostia is expected to improve soon. The D.C. Water and Sewer Authority is installing enormous new sewer pipes under the city which should capture 98 percent of overflows into the river when they are completed next year.

The report noted that historically people swam throughout the Anacostia and Potomac Rivers and Rock Creek and they could do so again if water quality is improved.

“The Nation’s Capital, bound together by its three major waterways, should provide residents with the opportunity to swim and cool off everywhere–increasingly important as the climate crisis makes our summers hotter and hotter, as well as stormier,” it said.

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