Electric Night Swimming | Bioplurb | Coney Island | BanG Studio

Pollutants could be found in the mechanical remediation sites. Naturally, the plants colonized the machines. Soon, the plant concentration at the collection machines became so dense that the machines were scarcely identifiable. By the end of the decade, the plants had set the machines free. The new hybrid plant/machines roamed the canal looking for new pollution to eat. Scientists named this hybrid system the bioplurb.
In the last decade, much of the bioplurb has starved. The water is no longer rich pollution. What remains is a bio-industrial ruin. The 2050, bioplurb is a relic of an industrial past. No longer functioning in its former role, it has become an amenity in the canal and the surrounding neighborhood. Swimmers climb its stalks and dive off into the clean water. Its branches have infiltrated local architecture creating transient spaces. Larger root-balls straddle the canal creating new and unplanned crossings.

The bioplurb has given a new identity to Gowanus. Its bioluminescence illuminates the canal at night. The locals swim at all hours under its soft glow. By reference to Coney Island, the locals call their night activity, “Electric Swimming.”........more