Philadelphia’s Green Monster

In case you didn’t know, the Comcast Center is supposed to be a certified “green” building, which means it will release oxygen or something. In fact, it will be the tallest green building in the United States, something we Philadelphians can, I suppose, be mighty proud of. Perhaps people will come from all over to see our tall building!

That being said, the plumbers’ union is against one of the cornerstones of the green building, waterless urinals. They’re against them because, obviously, they cost less money to maintain and less money to install. That means, uh, less money for plumbers.

And now, as noted earlier, John Street and Vince Fumo are both making a push to pretty much tell the plumbers’ union to, uhh, flush it. And, Sunday, there’s even a protest at Love Park at 1 p.m. that will also be telling the plumbers’ union the same thing.

Presumably, the protesters on Sunday will be there because they want to highlight the fact that the waterless urinals in the Comcast Center will save 1.6 million gallons of water a year. You might think that Vince Fumo is hoping to broker a deal with the plumbers’ union for the same reason. You also might have the brain of a gerbil.

While Fumo may love the water savings, he’s also in it for this reason:

Without the code change, it might be harder for Liberty to win a certificate from the Green Building Council. In that case, New York and its 945-foot-tall Bank of America tower would capture the title of America’s tallest green building.

Fumo “would love to see us beat New York on something like this,” Tuma said. “It’s all about the city’s image. The more good press we get, the more construction the city is going to get.”

And they say we don’t have an inferiority complex!

Fumo, Street join the push for waterless urinals [Inky]

Full protest info after the jump.

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