Which are awesome. I was utterly spoiled growing up in an old Manhattan apartment building with an enormous boiler in the basement. That apartment had – has, mom still lives there – torrential water pressure, and the shower stays hot no matter how long you’re in there, even during the morning rush with most of the 72+ units using them around the same time.
I was really shocked when I learned of the paltry shower acommodations most people in this country put up with. Whaddya mean I can’t do dishes or laundry while you’re in the shower? Whaddya mean don’t drink from the tap?
Oh, and because it’s a 12-story building with a big cold water tank on the roof and ample pipes, the toilet mechanisms are all Flushometers and don’t interfere with the shower’s temperature when flushed. And they never ever require any maintenance, unlike janky tank toilets with the Rube Goldberg nonsense mechanisms inside.
Haha, oddly enough I am the president of a 2-building, 12-story co-op
(don’t tell me your mom lives in Berkeley Towers, Queens…) and we are
replacing our twin 500-hp, 50-year old Scotch marines this summer. They are
beasts — overkill since we installed double-pane windows a few decades ago
— so we are dropping down to “mere” 350-hp. But on a zero-degree night like
we had this past January, when both of our current boilers were going
full-bore and keeping us heated and hot-watered, that was a sound to
behold. The whole boiler room would thrum at about 2 Hz.
the interesting part is now big cities are migrating back to city wide heat, it’s cheaper and more efficient long term thanks to the scale of it. this is of course assuming it is managed and maintained well.
