Have you ever heard of Brooklyn Bowl? I would imagine that not many people outside of that area would have. I mean, it’s just a bowling alley, seemingly like any other bowling alley throughout the United States, where bowlers throw heavy rubber balls down bowling lanes, looking for a strike here and a spare there.
On the outside, it may appear as if Brooklyn bowl is just your typical average type of bowling alley, but all is not as it seems. Brooklyn Bowl has gone green, and the sustainability and eco-friendliness there are second to none.
Wind power supplies all of the electricity for this establishment, with electronic pin spotters that use only 25 percent of the electricity that a regular pin spotter uses. And it gets better. They have a stage for entertainment purposes that is made entirely of 100 percent recycled tire rubber and floors in the bowlers lounge that are made of 100 percent reclaimed cork. All of the wood used in construction has come from certified sources by the Forest Stewardship Council, and even flushed water usage in urinals is one sixteenth of that used in a standard type.
Brooklyn bowl certainly shows what can be done when the right minds are at work with a little forward thinking, and our hats are off to this kind of eco-friendly recreation. But this isn’t the only recreational place going green.
In Oregon, the East Portland Community Center with their soon to be completed swimming pool, boasts a rooftop mounted solar panel array and a water efficiency design so innovative, it is going to qualify for a LEED platinum certification! And this for a swimming pool! (LEED is a third-party certification program and the nationally accepted benchmark for the design, construction and operation of high performance green buildings.)
How about the University of Maine? They have built a student recreational and fitness center that is also LEED certified, is energy efficient yet beautiful to look at. This recreational facility features 100 percent recycled wood products with no formaldehyde, low-flow plumbing, low VOC emitting paints, dedicated recycling areas, while cleaned and maintained with green eco-friendly products. The University of Maine is rightly proud of this building, and we are too.
Even our national parks are committed to going green. The National Park and Recreation Association (NPRA) is pushing an agenda for the greening of our national parks. Their offices have already gone green, and they want to implement and expand their practices to include all of the national park systems offices. Included in their green agenda they would like to mandate getting rid of paper products in staff kitchens, using 100 percent recycled toner cartridges in office environments, use environmentally friendly cleaning products, implementing a teleworking policy to save fuel and travel time for employees, and using Forest Stewardship Council certified materials for both paper products and buildings.
Sustainability is no longer a thing of the future, it is here and now, and Because Action speaks louder than words, even recreational venues have the ideas, the materials and the power to go green.
Source: BecauseAction.com
