THE WORLD IS FLAT

For centuries we’ve accepted that the world is round – well, most people have, anyway. Interestingly, a tiny minority of hold-outs maintain the world is flat and, in some respects, I actually agree with them.

In the context of the water cycle, the world is flat for city dwellers. The water cycle in an undeveloped non-urban environment relies on infiltration of rainwater hundreds of feet deep into the ground where aquifers are recharged and trees are nurtured. The meticulous rhythm of life.

Water infiltration in urban landscapes might reach six to ten feet at best. In cities, aquifers are replaced by subways, tunnels and power infrastructure – all of which do better without regular baths.

A depth-limited urban environment.

If somehow more rain fell in the forest than the cities, then all would be well. Without the opportunities for deep infiltration and massive uptake by plants, how can we manage all that city rainfall?  That is the million dollar question being addressed by Philadelphia’s Green City, Clean Waters program. Obviously no simple answer is available. Right now, the go-to solution appears to be massive underground ballroom-sized tanks to hold water. Sexy isn’t it? Why try to mimic a woodland water cycle with these expensive grey infrastructure cisterns? Even with these cisterns, too much rainwater is still ending up basements or in already-overwhelmed treatment plants.

Perhaps we city dwellers would do well to evaluate our relationship to water from a more two-dimensional perspective. Think like a flatlander. If all that rainwater can’t move vertically, then let’s allow it to move horizontally.  Go downtown and experience water all around you: trickling down from green roofs into sidewalk planters; seeping through a planted alley into a backlot raingarden; climbing up tree trunks to shady tree canopies. There are a million ways to celebrate the water that falls in pocket oases all around the city. Big cisterns always will have a place in city water management, but let’s not disregard the power and beauty of celebrating water as a resource and utilizing it on our city surfaces.

A depth-limited urban condition.

A depth-limited urban condition that celebrates the power of water and plants.  Image by Roofmeadow.

To live more harmoniously in our cities, let’s embrace the fact that our world is flat.

Music City Center’s Big Green Roof

Last week was a big week for sustainability in Nashville. Nashville’s new convention center, the Music City Center, garnered the Special Recognition award at 2014 Cities Alive conference.

The urban hub includes an array of 845 solar panels, LED lighting, a 360,000 gallon rainwater cistern and, of course a four acre green roof.  Just by existing, this living building generates 271,000 kW per year; channels rainwater to flush 500 toilets and irrigate the site landscape, and annually prevents 3,382,767 gallons of rainwater from entering the city’s sewer system. By optimizing sunlight and shade, insulating materials, and a high performance HVAC system, this building imposes a 20% smaller burden on the electrical grid than a similarly sized building.  Walls, fabrics, woods, carpets and coatings were selected to improve indoor air quality.  Of course, the Music City Center recycles (almost everything!), and leftover food and registration materials are donated to non-profit organizations.  “Waste” is just not in their lexicon.

Alas, this is a green roof blog . . . and this green roof is more than just a pretty roof. Aside from managing massive amounts of stormwater and generating huge amounts of electricity, the roof is now recognized as a colossal living, breathing logo for the Music City Center.

Rooftop guitar body with solar panels and green roof frets.

If you ever find yourself in Nashville airspace, you really can’t miss the monstrous rooftop guitar body with green, living sound waves undulating out to the roof edges. That’s a pretty expert bit of city-wide product placement!

Blue Angels in the airspace above Music City Center.  Photo courtesy Greenrise Technologies.

The green roof’s sine wave topography — evocative of the Tennessee hillside, required some muscular engineering (which Team Roofmeadow was proud to provide). Pitches range from 16% – 25%, requiring integrated slope stabilization measures.

A view up a steep Sedum slope on the Music City Center green roof.

The extremely lean 2.5-inch thick green roof profile weighs in at only 17.5 pounds per square foot (at its heaviest) and is designed to maximize the time water flows horizontally through the root zone before exiting at the drains, reducing irrigation requirements.

The thin profile is sloped to maximize the time roots and water have contact.

Base capillary irrigation evenly distributes water, notwithstanding the laws of physics which otherwise would leave and rooftop hills parched and the valleys soaked. Pre-grown Sedum mats helped to protect the roof from wind uplift and scour.

This elegant and hardworking landscape embodies the spirit of Nashville’s progressive stormwater policy.

Visible from surrounding buildings, the monolithic roofscape offers seasonal variation through broad swaths of color: yellow and pink in the spring, green in the summer and red and russet in the fall.

Roofmeadow would like to take this opportunity to acknowledge the rest of the team who made the green roof on this Nashville icon a reality:

tvs design: Architect

Greenrise Technologies: Green roof contractor

Sempergreen: Pre-grown Sedum mat provider

Sika Sarnafil: Waterproofing provider

The view from a neighboring building.

The LEED Silver building also garnered the 2013 Governor’s Environmental Stewardship Award.  The award winning roof is home not only to plants but to grasshoppers, praying mantises, butterflies, moths, bees, doves and hawks.

A grasshopper at home on the Music City Center green roof.

LOOK OUT AND BE WELL AT THE UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA HOSPITAL

Think about the last time you were laid up, sick – or worse, in the hospital. Even if your healing required aid from others, instinct probably directed you (or at least your attention) outdoors – to help you heal yourself.

View from a patient’s room at the UVA Hospital.

Studies suggest that the restorative experience of nature imparts a sense of freedom and a connectivity to something larger. In this state, the mind-body instinctively boosts mood, self-esteem and focus and reduces stress. The soul in its natural state – in nature – is fueled.

Green roof pyramids echo the shape of the skylights.

Healing places tap into this phenomenon, and Roofmeadow is honored to have shared this particular healing mission with the University of Virginia Hospital in Charlottesville. For its new hospital expansion, the University sought a green roof that would be visible from patient rooms. Our design team responded to Charlottesville’s terrain of winding rivers, agricultural fields, and wooded hills. The design abstracts this imagery into patterns with distinctive and seasonal contrasts of foliage color, texture, height and bloom. Strategic hardscape – narrow curbs, edgings, decorative aggregate – add crisp lines which add clarity to the visual pattern.

A distinct pattern provides visual interest.

Every time you look upon this dynamic roofscape – morning or evening, summer or winter — shadows, wind, and seasonal foliage and blooms create a new experience. Sedum pyramids extend the pyramid skylight pattern. Like sundials, all the pyramids – green or glass – generate a dance of shadows across the roof that changes in unison throughout the day. Extending from a blue glass aggregate river, bands of ornamental grasses move in the wind, animating the roof with fluctuating texture and movement.

Ornamental grasses will mature and provide horticultural and visual interest.

A beautiful design is lost without the expert contractors and quality materials that bring it to life. During construction, green roof installer, Greenrise Technologies, and Sedum mat provider, Sempergreen, collaborated closely with Roofmeadow to make this vision a reality.

Greenrise and Sempergreen on site during construction.

To the patients at the University of Virginia Hospital, Team Roofmeadow says, “Be well.”

BE WELL!

#TRUEGREEN

By Melissa Muroff, Esq. 

A couple of years ago, the Sustainable Business Network of Philadelphia tapped Roofmeadow and a few other firms to test drive the prospect of forming an industry group to advocate on behalf of Green Stormwater Infrastructure (GSI) in the Philadelphia area.  Primary objectives included advancing the local GSI industry (read, local job creation) and fostering innovation.  The GSI Partners has evolved and is collaborating with like-minded contingents at BIA, DVGBC among others. As a result, a fierce commitment to promoting green infrastructure over grey has surfaced. #TrueGreen has become a rallying cry in these circles.  In fact, voices promoting grey infrastructure are notably silent.  So, if we all are in agreement (and that’s a big “if”) – from government to developers to designers to contractors, where is all the green infrastructure?

Consider our current paradigm: Philadelphia’s goal is to create nearly 9,000 Greened Acres.  Great start!

A one acre green roof in Philadelphia along the banks of the Schuylkill River.

But if we continue down the course we are headed, our math suggests that the 9,000 Greened Acres will be comprised mostly of grey infrastructure.  Sort of sucks the wind out of your sails, doesn’t it?

Grey infrastructure installation.

Here’s what I think: Turning around this behemoth ship of the Philadelphia water infrastructure requires a total rethink, not just a regulatory tweak or the will of a few urban champions.  An increasingly vocal collective of whip-smart designers and developers are challenging our grey legacy.  In charrettes, design competitions (Soak It Up) and built developments (Ice House, RidgeFlats), innovators are demonstrating new ways to interact with rainwater and plants; they are artists at work with a living palette. This group of leaders isn’t designing and building green roofs, living walls, rain gardens, and urban tree groves just to win stormwater credits.  It’s much bigger than that.  They envision a new urban experience where concrete and glass interact dynamically with plants, habitat and moving water to create natural spaces that draw us in, soothe us and stimulate us. Places where we inherently belong.  It’s what David Waxman of MM Partners called, “the outdoor Philadelphia experience,” and this is the Philadelphia I want to live in.

And this is your call to action:

The industry’s efforts to promote, measure, and finance green infrastructure are growing and gaining momentum every day, but we need your support. Interested?  Then join us this Tuesday morning at the GSI Partners quarterly meeting!

RSVP here.

Our Newest Green Roof Innovation: A Revolutionary Fall Protection System

The Diadem Lifeguard (FLG) Dynamic Fall Arrest System represents a great advance in green roof safety.

Assembled on-site by Roofmeadow® certified green roof companies using components furnished by Diadem®, installations are supported by both Diadem® and Roofmeadow®, including installer certification, site-specific layout, and field quality assurance.  The system is self-ballasted and therefore Includes no attachments to structure of any kind.  Because of this the system layout is not constrained by architectural features or roof structure.  Incorporated into the profile during the green roof construction, installations are rapid and cost efficient.  Slender spring-steel support posts are nearly invisible from a distance and do not detract for the aesthetic a green roof.

August 2014, Jackson National Insurance Headquarters, Lansing, Michigan.

The Diadem Lifeguard (FLG) Dynamic Fall Arrest System operates using the principle of kinetic energy absorption and has been tested by TRI Environmental, a pre-eminent testing laboratory in the United States, in order to demonstrate conformance of the system with ANSI/ASSE Z359.1.

The first installation of this system occurred in August 2014 at the Jackson National Insurance headquarters in Lansing, Michigan and it involves over 600 linear feet of fall protection cable.

Charlie Miller, Roofmeadow Founder and President, on site during the first ever installation of Diadem’s Dynamic Fall Arrest System.

This cutting-edge system is the culmination of a decade of collaboration between Diadem and Roofmeadow and will ensure the safety of green roof maintenance crews for decades to come.

Troy Clogg crew member demonstrating the revolutionary fall protection system.

Chicago Roof-to-Table Launch Event

Roofmeadow:

EAT UP Chicago!

Originally posted on EAT UP:

Hold onto your knickers, Chicago!  EAT UP’s coming to town.  On August 20th from 6:00-8:00 pm we will celebrate EAT UP’s Midwest book launch and Roof-to-Table Photography Exhibition opening at Uncommon Ground (1401 W. Devon Ave).  The book launch will take place amidst tomatoes and peppers within the restaurant’s rooftop farm, or indoors if raining.  The Photography Exhibition will hang below in the restaurant from August 20 – September 15.

Roof-to-Table Launch Event Philly ||  photo by Jane Winkel

The event is open to the public, so please come and enjoy Literature (book sale and signing), Art (30 rooftop photos from EAT UP framed with “twice-reclaimed lumber”), and Food (roof-fresh nibbles provided by Uncommon Ground).

With so many food roofs across the Windy City’s skyline, come see for yourself what all the fuss is about by exploring Uncommon Ground‘s own rooftop farm up close.  The Photography Exhibition will whet your…

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A Trip to Emory Knoll

by Jane Winkel

It was a beautiful day for a trip to Emory Knoll. It was (still is) early spring; it was a Friday; it was sunny. I stopped for gas before driving onto I-95, and ran through a list of sedum species trying to recall the habit of each as I pumped a full tank of mid-grade. Lost in thoughts – plants, unpaid bills, directions to the nursery, I neglected to notice the defective pump for about 3 seconds too long. The auto-stop-at-full feature had ceased to function and fuel was dripping into a clear slippery puddle at my feet. I presented my credit card and my complaint to the attendant and she casually offered a complimentary car wash.

Ed Snodgrass, Emory Knoll founder has been in the business of plants for most of his life and he has written a number of books that are must reads for those interested in green roofing. His book Green Roof Plants is regularly consulted within the Roofmeadow office.

The preeminent plantsman in one of his many species specific hot houses

The nursery is full of plants for sale to the green roof trade, although upon approach the farm stands out because of the swath of bamboo that serves as a screen from road traffic. Dramatic, beautiful and planted with a purpose the swath is a habitat and home for many birds and critters.

Ed is developing a potting mix that mimics the porosity of green roof media, but is made from waste products (coconut husk, rice hulls and some pine bark). Plants started in this media are less resistant to rooting out into green roof media when they are transplanted from the nursery to the roof. Low embedded energy and reuse of materials that would otherwise be headed to the landfill make the mix pretty darn sustainable.

Walking through the cutting beds, which contain plants that have been started from seed, I wondered about the possibility of spreading sedum seed on roofs (an infrequent practice in the green roof biz). To achieve germination seeds must be sown on a cool misty early spring day when the conditions are just so.

The selection of Sedum album which was collected from sites around the globe, is remarkable because of the variability in color, size and shape from plant to plant. Because of this collection, Emory Knoll can provide plants with a provenance that is similar to that of a projects’ climate.

Photo by Ed Snodgrass, ‘Women in the Fields’ taken while plant hunting in Morocco

I was lucky enough to receive a Senecio jacobsenii ‘Trailing Jade’ plug and a cutting of the loveliest peach tinted Echeveria from the hothouse, which contains particular plants of uncommon beauty. In return I shared a bag of my turmeric sea salt walnuts.

‘Senecio jacobsenii ‘Trailing Jade’

Peach tinted Echeveria from which I have a cutting – a cutting that has begun to sprout roots!

If you time it right the drive is about 1.5 hours from Philadelphia, (if you time it wrong plan to spend an extra hour sitting in traffic on I-95). Once you are off the highway, expect a scenic drive through rural Maryland. In a town called Dublin, you even pass a pasture with goats and mini ponies (tiny tiny thigh high ponies!).

Emory Knoll accepts visitors by appointment. I recommend visiting the farm to see a radiant collection of plants, the Emory Knoll green roof and the adjacent 15 year old solar array.

Old solar panel with fresh palm print

The llama skull planted in the bathtub with Echeveria eyes and the jointed femur & tibia are just an extra special added touch to the Emory Knoll landscape.

Llama bath

Llama skull, Echeveria eye and Sedum album bubbles

An early spring view from the Emory Knoll green roof as the plants begin to break free from winter dormancy

Designing to Survive – Helping Our Native Plants Adapt to Climate Change

By Laura Hansplant, ASLA, LEED AP, Director of Design at Roofmeadow

Whether I am focusing on green roofs or ground landscapes, I cannot escape the undeniable: Climate change is making an impact. What can designers and landowners do about it?

I’m going to start with an essential distinction.

Scale matters.  The choices we make about landscapes at a regional scale matter a lot.  Our ability to conserve large natural areas – such as habitat preserves and greenway corridors – is important. These big habitats offer opportunities for native species that we just can’t replicate, ecologically, within our developed landscapes. Integrating these large-scale habitats demands a coordinated, committed effort among civic leaders, conservancy organizations, and advocacy groups – an arduous campaign well worth the effort. (Read more about how regional land conservation can be a corner stone of climate change mitigation: Ontario’s Greenbelt strategy and Carolinian Canada.)

My scale, however, has a much smaller footprint – a reality that applies to most people I know. Can we impact climate change when designing a single green roof, managing a meadow, or building a cutting garden at home? As you might guess, I have a few thoughtful recommendations.

1.  Incorporate native plant communities into the places we live and work.  Just any collection of native plants will not do. Deliberately select a suite of native species that play together well in the same, umm, mulch bed.  Specifically, look to reference plant communities in your ecoregion, and in ecoregions south, for reference communities likely to adapt well to the specific geology and soils of your site.  Also consider how plants knit together in an integral, layered way, leaving less space for weeds (and less time spent managing them). Happily, pollinating insects and birds fare better when we design with a broad range of plant species. .

2.  Preserve genetic diversity.  Many plants sold in nurseries are reproduced vegetatively, which means they are genetically identical. Genetic diversity imparts resilience to extreme weather and opportunistic pests. So, to foster resilient landscapes, specify seed-propagated, straight species instead of cultivars.  Look for regional ecotypes which offer specific adaptive traits.

3.  Leverage the geography of plant production. People are probably the biggest movers of plants around the regional and national landscape.  Often, plants have been shipped around the region, if not across the country, by the time they arrive at a project site.  In light of these logistics, leverage your plant ordering for good. Climate change dynamics are suggesting that native plant communities might not be able to migrate fast enough to keep up, but the design community can lend a hand. For more common natives, order appropriate plants from southern ecoregions and help in a small way to shift regional populations northward. (I propose this concept of a human assist to plant migration with full deference to the implications of this strategy for rare plant conservation.)

Can you distinguish the cultivar from the straight species?

4.  Allow plant reproduction in designs.  We don’t often allow plants to reproduce in the landscapes around our buildings.  I think it’s time to loosen up a bit. What is the point of promoting genetic diversity, recognizing regional plant provenance, and leveraging regional production patterns if we don’t allow plants to reproduce?  Landscapes are not static; our expectations must shift to align with the way nature works and evolves.  What if we took a more adaptive approach, one that made use of (managed) change as a healthy part of our site maintenance practices?

5.  Foster healthy soils.  Take a ‘roots up’ approach to site stewardship that promotes healthy living soils as the foundation of a low maintenance, healthy plant community.  I’m intrigued by the potential of soil transplanting (in large intact blocks, not mass grading) as a salvage and restoration technique that carries, living and intact, herbaceous plants and seedlings, seed bank, soil microorganisms, and soil structure.

6.  Green our urban environments with a new generation of green roofs and high performance stormwater Best Management Practices.  Recent advances in green infrastructure design offer a stable, healthy approach to managing rainfall while simultaneously providing a wide range of other environmental services (including carbon sequestration). Check out Philadelphia’s innovative green infrastructure program and recent design competition. Green roofs can be lightweight, relatively inexpensive, and easily implemented over large areas – think urban heat island mitigation! Alternatively, deep soil green roofs can be designed for habitat value – think meadow roofs and wetland roofs!   Both types add value to our urban environments.

Green roof on The Radian, Philadelphia, PA

Roofmeadow’s invested in Feeding Cities

By Lauren Mandel, MLA, ASLA

As Roofmeadow’s resident Rooftop Agriculture Specialist, I was delighted to attend a food security conference in Philadelphia this past week.  “Feeding Cities: Food Security in a Rapidly Urbanizing World” attracted scientists, regional planners, urban farmers, and food security experts from around the globe, resulting in robust dialogue with an international flair.  The University of Pennsylvania and Rockefeller Foundation hosted the two-day event, which showcased the organizational prowess of the Penn Institute for Urban Research, PennDesign, The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, and the School of Veterinary Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, among others.

Feeding Cities 2013

Lecture and panel discussion topics addressed diverse issues that reflected the presenters’ varied backgrounds.  Topics spanned from water resource management to food supply chains to the geopolitics of urban food security.  When viewed holistically, the talks addressed a singular, underlying questions: How do we balance the competing needs of water and food security as urban populations rapidly increase?

One panel discussion that I attended examined regional planning strategies that promote peri-urban farmland protection, or protection of farmland along the rural-urban fringe, in expanding cities.  Speakers highlighted strategies from their resident countries of Canada, Scotland, China, and the US, revealing that cities in different countries are attempting to achieve the same goal through varying methods.  The conclusion?  Each city demands a unique farmland protection strategy that satisfies local geography and culture.  This is not the easiest solution in terms of developing national strategies, but the experts seemed to agree that custom solutions are more likely to catalyze favorable results.

So where does rooftop agriculture fit into this conversation?  Well, speakers from Sri Lanka and the Middle East listed this edgy type of urban food production as a strategy deployed in their regions.  Roofmeadow applauds the global promotion of rooftop agriculture, and hopes to contribute to North America’s movement in the years to come.

My Green Roof, My Classroom

By Alison Love

My name is Alison Love, and I am a student at Germantown Friends School (GFS).  Every year, my school gives eleventh graders the month of January off to participate in an internship of their choice.  The students research and set up their own projects.  For my Junior Project, I interned at Roofmeadow.  I could not have found a more warm and welcoming place to work.  Everyone at Roofmeadow was extremely friendly and encouraging, despite their busy schedules.  My days mostly consisted of working on the maintenance aspect of the business, as well as attending daily and topical meetings.  I worked with their project database, Maintenance Manuals, and Maintenance Reports.  I could see how roofs developed over time and what happened to the plants depending on the season.  I was able to learn about the roofs while simultaneously doing work.

Roofmeadow intern, Alison Love, preparing to get to work on the GFS green roof.

While working at Roofmeadow, I went up on the GFS green roof with Jane Winkel for an inspection.  It was interesting and fun (despite the freezing weather) to visit the roof because I was able to apply the work I was doing in the office to a real green roof.  To evaluate the roof, we laid down a surveyor tape and recorded the position of the line.  We placed a 1.5’x1.5’ collapsible square at the beginning of the tape.  In this square, we counted the number of different species of plants and weeds.  We estimated the coverage of vegetation and evaluated the root development.  We took samples of unknown plants and uncommonly damp soil.  After inspecting and photographing the square, we repeated the process 20 feet along the tape until we reached the end of the roof.  We checked the drains and overall sun coverage of the roof. The process was precisely documented so that students can potentially repeat it in the future.  Roofmeadow and GFS are hoping to set up an ongoing relationship.

One of the transects on the GFS green roof: simple but effective

I was also able to join some of the Roofmeadow staff on a visit to the Penn State University Agricultural Analytical Services Laboratory, where Roofmeadow sends media (soil) and irrigation water samples to be tested.  We were given a tour of the lab and a greenhouse where different green roof fabrics are tested.

It was a great experience to visit the Penn State Lab and the GFS green roof as well as to be a part of the Roofmeadow office.  It was wonderful to be part of a group that is working on innovative solutions to local and global environmental challenges.  I was learning constantly about green roof construction and benefits as well as operating a small business. I loved spending January at Roofmeadow and hope to come back soon.