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Bathroom breaks aren’t required for crane operators on construction sites. A new bill could change that.

Operators in Philadelphia often stay in their crane compartments all day. They eat and use the bathroom in the same small space.

The sun setting behind construction cranes in University City in August, seen from the rooftop urban park Cira Green. City Council is considering legislation that would require breaks for the operators of tower cranes like the one pictured.
The sun setting behind construction cranes in University City in August, seen from the rooftop urban park Cira Green. City Council is considering legislation that would require breaks for the operators of tower cranes like the one pictured.Read moreTOM GRALISH / Staff Photographer

A crane operator asked City Council members to imagine themselves “stuck in this little four-by-six area for eight hours in which you have to urinate, defecate in bottles and buckets, eat in that space, and then carry your excrement to the ground with you.”

Dan Mitchell, a member of the International Union of Operating Engineers Local 542 and of the State Board of Crane Operators, explained that unpleasant scenario is one that tower crane operators live through during each shift at construction sites across Philadelphia.

Council is considering legislation that would require supervisors to give tower crane operators breaks of at least 30 minutes every four hours. Supervisors also would have to allow operators to leave the crane for restroom breaks at any time. Currently, breaks are allowed, but they are not required, and most operators stay in their crane for the majority of their shifts.

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During breaks, supervisors would be allowed to assign another operator to continue working the crane, according to the bill, which Council members moved out of committee last week to be considered by the full Council.

How the requirements would be enforced is an open question. And the building industry raised concerns that requiring operators to climb up and down hundreds of steps multiple times per shift presents its own safety hazard.

Councilmember Mark Squilla, who introduced the legislation with Councilmember Mike Driscoll, said the bill came about from his visits to construction sites and conversations with workers, who told him about staying up in the cranes all day.

“I thought, ‘This sounds sort of draconian,’” Squilla said in an interview. “There’s no way they should be up there all day long and have to stay up there where they’re eating and going to the bathroom. It sounded to me like something from the industrial days.”

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Manny Citron, chief of staff in the Philadelphia Department of Labor, said during the Nov. 29 hearing that the bill “will make straightforward and commonsense changes” to the section of the Philadelphia Code that regulates use and inspection of tower and mobile cranes.

“With the complexity and scale of many modern construction sites, this administration believes that it is in the interest of safety to the operator, their coworkers on the job, and also the public at large that workers operating critical machinery such as tower cranes should have regular access to breaks,” Citron said. “Additionally, we believe that all employees should have reasonable access to sanitary facilities.”

Speaking on behalf of the Building Industry Association of Philadelphia, Vaughan Buckley, chief executive officer of Volumetric Building Cos., said the association is “in full support of anything that enhances worker safety” but objects to the bill’s language requiring, instead of allowing, breaks.

On a 320-foot tower crane, operators could have to climb as many as 500 steps to go up and another 500 to get down, Buckley said. At minimum, the legislation “would require them to ascend and descend six times on a 10-hour shift,” he said. “This is a combined ascent and descent of 1,800 feet and nearly 3,000 rungs of a ladder. The idea that such a requirement is an enhancement to operator safety is really challenged by the facts.”

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Requiring operators to ascend and descend more often “exposes them to physical stressors” that could violate national safety protocols and could endanger workers forced to leave their cranes in inclement weather, Buckley said.

The requirement “exposes the operators and the owners to a terrible choice,” he said. “They can either follow the law, or they can enhance operator safety. In some cases, it will not be possible to do both.”

Squilla said that he would continue conversations with the building industry and that if having workers go up and down several times becomes a problem, the city can revisit the requirements.

“I think we have an opportunity to help” crane operators, Squilla said.