Philadelphia Water and Head of the Schuylkill Regatta teamed up to give away 15,000 reusable bottles Oct. 24-25. It's part of a new effort to encourage people to save money with tap water and fight litter with refillable bottles. Credit: Philadelphia Water/Brian Rademaekers

There were lots of big names and important figures on the banks of the Schuylkill on Oct. 23 to announce a new network of water bottle filling stations along the Schuylkill River Trail, "America's Best Urban Trail" and Philadelphia's most popular recreational path.

But perhaps the most important (and certainly the cutest) people there were the 4th grade students from FS Edmonds Elementary School. Fresh from a field trip to the Fairmount Water Works, the kids enthusiastically took the #DrinkTapPHL/Schuylkill Navy River Stewards pledge to “Choose to Reuse” and were given some of the 15,000 free refillable bottles ordered for the new drinking water/anti-litter campaign. (For photos from Friday's kickoff, click here.)

Volunteers at Apps for Philly Sustainability use data provided by Philadelphia Water to work on the new Big Green App project. Credit: Matthew Fritch, Philadelphia Water.

By Matthew Fritch for the
Watersheds Blog

Last week, Philadelphia Water released a treasure trove of data in advance of Apps for Philly Sustainability, a three-day event that brought together sustainability professionals and technologists. Their mission? Conquer the city's problems with code. Armed with datasets and digital know-how, teams of students and tech professionals developed apps to help the homeless find resources, assist students with learning disabilities, and track individual energy consumption. (See more details on the various projects here.)

But the project we're most excited about is a Big Green App (hat tip to the Big Green Map).

Head to the Guild Hall Brewing Co. on Oct. 20 and send some of your beer money to a local watershed! Credit: TTF Watershed Partnership.

At the start of the month, we lamented in the Philadelphia Inquirer that water infrastructure, which is often underground and out of sight, just doesn’t seem to get the same attention or funding as things that we see daily, like roads and bridges.

In many ways, it’s the same with beer, too: hops, malt and yeast get all the glory among beer snobs. But, ask any brewer, and they’ll tell you the truth: great water is just as important, if not more so, as all the other stuff that goes into a quality brew.

It’s no surprise then that local breweries like Victory (Headwaters Pale), Saucony Creek (Stonefly IPA) and Sly Fox (SRT Ale) all have beers that pay tribute (and actual profits) to the health of our local waterways.

Now, beer and watershed lovers in Northeast Philly and lower Montco have a beer of their own to hoist while drinking to health of their local stream. Watershed Wit is a new brew from a new, Jenkintown-based brewhouse, Guild Hall Brewing Company.

Located a short walk from the headwaters of the Tookany Creek, they draw tons of water from the local watershed every time they fire up the brew kettle. Good water quality isn’t an abstract concept for this business; they’re intimately aware of the need to protect our rivers and creeks.

In recognition of this basic fact, they’ve pledged a whopping 10 percent of Watershed Wit proceeds to support Tookany/Tacony-Frankford (TTF) Creek Watershed Partnership's mission to improve the health and vitality of the Tookany/Tacony-Frankford Creek. An incredibly dedicated group, TTF is constantly raising awareness about the need to protect and improve their watershed, and Philadelphia Water works closely with them on issues like education, water quality, and stream restoration.

To celebrate the release of this new, refreshing wheat beer (think Hoegaarden or Blue Moon), TTF and Guild Hall are throwing a tapping party dubbed “Creek to Craft” on Tuesday Oct. 20 at the brewery’s restaurant. Click here to learn more and get tickets.


Even if you can’t make the party, remember – grabbing a pint or growler still goes to the great cause of protecting one of Philly’s seven watersheds! Can we say cheers?