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pool safety tips

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Give Your Pool a Little Something Extra with Features and Enhancements

There are endless possibilities for adding extras when remodeling your Monmouth County swimming pool. When you include additional features to your swimming pool area, you are enhancing and customizing your backyard environment. Remember – even the smallest changes can make a difference with a pool remodel. Not only will these features add enjoyment to your swimming pool experience, but they can also possibly add value to your home.
Water Features

There are a number of water features that you can add to a swimming pool area during a pool remodel that can enhance the entire backyard environment. A water feature allows you to enjoy the soothing sound and shimmering sight of falling water.

Waterfalls

Add something extra to your pool area with a creative waterfall. Imagine a natural-stone waterfall made with stones collected from your region of the country with water cascading over them into your pool. Many companies also offer natural-looking artificial stone waterfalls for a fraction of the price of natural stones. Waterfalls are the perfect complement to lagoon-style or free form pools, and they also can add visual interest and beauty to more standard shapes. Add a full rock wall complete with cascading water to one end of your pool and enjoy the illusion of relaxing at the foot of a mountain. For a romantic feature, create a private rock cave hidden behind your new waterfall. Underwater seating ledges can make your cave even more appealing!

Fountain Bubblers

Fountain bubblers protrude upward like mini-geysers and are usually built into a pool’s shallow sun ledge. They are extremely popular with kids, look great with most pools and are fairly inexpensive.

Deck Jets

Deck jets create a great look as they shoot streams of water from the deck to the pool, but they must be placed properly to perform well. You can get more dramatic with laminar jets, which produce a solid stream of bubble-free water, and add color by illuminating them with fiber-optics. To prevent water from splashing onto walkways and other areas, wind sensors can be installed to shut off the jets when winds go over 5 mph.

Water Slides

A swimming pool waterslide integrated into the pool landscape gives you the feel of a water park in your backyard! With endless fun for children and adults, a water slide is the ultimate addition to any pool. Modern swimming pool slides come in a variety of sizes. Some provide a straight, quick drop into the swimming pool, while others offer a gentle curve to the left or right. There are even slides that are longer and spin into corkscrew turns. It's possible to build slides into other pool features such as rocks and landscaping. Any pool slide must drop into water deep enough to be safe for the swimmer. Many waterslides require professional installation to meet safety guidelines established by municipal building codes.

Add a Hot Tub

One of the best pool area remodeling projects to promote health and wellness is the addition of a spa. Hydrotherapy, or warm water therapy in hot tub, consists of three main healing ingredients; heat, buoyancy, and massage. Together, they create an experience that is both relaxing and healthy. Hot tub hydrotherapy on a regular basis provides physical health benefits that go much deeper than just relaxation and pleasure.

Water is so pure and simple, yet it can do the most amazing things. Whether you are experiencing joint or muscle pain, having trouble sleeping, or are just plain stressed out, spending time in hot tub spas can provide therapeutic benefits for just about everyone.

Resistance Jets

Another way to promote your health and fitness by remodeling a pool area is to add resistance jets to a lap pool. This provides an “endless” current that a swimmer can swim against. Swimming is an activity that can be done at any age and provides an excellent workout of all muscle groups.

Lighting Extras

A well-lit pool with an interesting lighting design is a must-have feature for your pool remodel that makes it even more appealing. When planning your pool lighting design, take your yard, landscape and pool size and design into consideration to highlight the best features. The shape of the pool is a notable factor, as curvilinear pools require more land analysis than rectangular ones. The color of the pool's interior finish also influences lighting decisions. For instance, how will the color rendering of the lamp be represented? Also, take into account the texture of the pool's interior. Different lighting sources can produce a variety of shadow effects based on the nature of the surface material, which can sometimes highlight subtle imperfections. Here are some lighting options:

Fiber-optic & LED

Recent advances in new technologies offer a variety of alternatives to the traditional swimming pool light. Fiber optics employ end-emitting or side-emitting fiber-optic cables, transmitting light from a remotely located high-intensity discharge light box. Side-emitting fiber-optic lighting can be installed in the wall of the pool or under the pool's coping. Fiber-optic applications can generate a soft and uniform lighting effect. End-emitting fiber-optic cables can be strategically placed throughout the pool's bottom to fashion whimsical points of light in patterns that resemble constellations. Light-emitting diodes (LEDs) are another emergent technology in outdoor illumination and are now available in submerged lighting. LEDs are like tiny light bulbs that fit easily into an electric circuit. Many pool owners choose them over incandescent bulbs because they neither get hot nor do they have a filament to burn out.

Moon Lighting

When establishing atmosphere, it is important to know where pool owners spend most of their time while outdoors at night. Will they be relaxing, swimming or entertaining? The submerged fixtures in the pool should produce a hint of illumination on the surrounding deck, but in order to achieve an atmosphere of comfort and safety, additional lighting is often required. Instead of lighting the pool deck directly, angle light toward surrounding beds, letting it spill onto the deck. Like the illumination from the sun and the moon, the most natural form of lighting comes from above. If a tree canopy hangs over the pool deck, moonlighting or downlighting can create a mystical effect. Tree-mounted fixtures should be at least 30 feet above the ground, with soft tones filtering through delicate limbs or lacey leaves to evoke subtle shadowing on the beds and walkways below. Seek out trees with interesting architecture. If these trees are dramatically lit and close enough to the pool, turn off the pool lighting and enjoy the tree's tranquil reflections on the water. A combination of uplighting and downlighting on trees will result in a natural grounded effect. If there are no large trees near the pool deck, fixtures can be mounted on pergolas, arbors and even from the eaves of the house. Avoid severe angles and do not point lights toward seating areas.

Uplighting

Soft uplighting adds a touch of class to any setting. Consider creating a wall of light using a series of visually appealing trees. The trees do not need to be on the edge of the property, they may be relatively close to the pool deck, thereby narrowing the view to the immediate area. A general rule of thumb is that the brightest lighting should be the most distant.

Path lighting is a much smaller version of downlighting. This popular fixture treatment displays streams of light along walkways, steps and beds. Be careful not to overuse path lights - less is more. While it is important to light steps and walkways, remember that not all walkways will be used at night. Another way to light stairs is via step lights. They can be built-in during the creation of walls and stairs or surface mounted after construction. For surface-mounted fixtures, consider using deck lights similar to those mounted on the posts of wooden decks.

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