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All European Member States make great efforts to improve the quality of existing bathing waters, to provide up-to-date information on their state to the public, and to make bathing feasible in urbanised and formerly heavily polluted surface waters. Significant investments in urban waste water treatment plants, improvements in sewage networks and other measures have contributed to a reduction in ‘poor’ bathing water quality in more than 3000 large cities in Europe. Safe bathing is now possible in many European capitals – including Amsterdam, Berlin, Budapest, Copenhagen, London, Riga and Vienna, – a feat that would have been unimaginable in the 1970s.

Thanks to successful environmental policy and management guided by the BWD, the percentage of European bathing waters achieving at least ‘sufficient’ quality (the minimum quality standards set by BWD) increased from just 74% in 1991 to over 95% in 2003, and has remained quite stable since then. The percentage of bathing waters at the highest water quality (classified as ‘excellent’) has increased from 53% in 1991 to 85% in 2019. Thanks to common European action, more than eight out of ten of Europe’s monitored bathing waters now have ‘excellent’ water quality.