What’s The Difference Between That And Co-Ops And Hotels That Heat The Sidewalk?

It’s good that we have such a small carbon footprint — this way we don’t have to feel guilty for enjoying the generosity of corporate shop owners who graciously air condition the sidewalk:

Not for the first time, Jo Gangemi felt anger well up as she passed a clothing store on Prince Street the other day. There this shop was, with its air-conditioning on high and its front doors wide open, the cold pouring wastefully, senselessly — outrageously — onto the sidewalk. Like so many other stores on blisteringly hot days.

Ms. Gangemi, a psychiatric nurse practitioner who lives in SoHo, walked in and asked the employees how they could justify this profligacy. She knew what the answer would be before it was offered.

“They always say, ‘It’s not up to me; it’s company policy,'” she said. So she called the company’s main office. There, she spoke with a woman who sounded both “sympathetic and somewhat condescending.”

“She said they had a ‘green team’ forming,” Ms. Gangemi said.