Thirsty Prospect Park-goers will no longer have to worry about germ-spreading spigot-suckers or thirsty dogs slobbering all over the spout now that new, bottle-friendly bubblers are being unveiled.
Brooklyn’s backyard plans to replace some of its standard drinking fountains —the kind dogs can easily slobber all over with a little help from a human — with six new fountains specifically designed for filling bottles to the top and carrying them away.
The five-foot-tall filling stations are designed to let run water vertically into a bottle held beneath it at the touch of a button. The new design allows parched park-goers to easily fill up their bottles instead of having to turn on an angle, as they are forced to do at ordinary fountains (the filling stations also have a standard drinking fountain attached, so you can still just take a sip and continue your run).
Avid park-goer Anthony Elder said the fountains will revolutionize the way people drink water in the park.
“At the regular fountains, you can only fill your bottle up halfway due to how shallow the basin is,” he said. “The top-down water delivery is much more intuitive for dealing with bottles, eliminating the frustration of having to fill up at a standard fountain.”
The fountains are made and donated by the company Smart Tap and are being installed by the Prospect Park Alliance, which hopes to convince park-goers that refilling bottles is cheaper — and better for the environment — than buying and throwing out containers of store-bought water.
“The bottle-filling stations encourage park-goers to carry reusable bottles and reduce the consumption of plastic, water bottles,” said Alliance spokesman Paul Nelson.
The first Smart Tap fountain was installed last month in the greenspace next to the Nethermead. Five new stations — at Sixth Street and West Drive, near Field One in the Long Meadow ball fields, along the East Drive across from the Peristyle, near Field Six at the Parade Ground, and at the Center Drive and East Drive intersection — will soon be installed.
Reach reporter Natalie Musumeci at nmusumeci@cnglocal.com or by calling (718) 260-4505. Follow her at twitter.com/souleddout.
