Living Structures: Green Area Ratio
Living in the city has many benefits, from always having a new restaurant to explore to walking or using the metro as your means of transportation. Even with all its perks, living in urban places often means that you are surrounded by more concrete and buildings than green areas. This gray jungle takes a toll on both the environment and your wellbeing. Property Improvement Enterprises aims to redevelop properties in a sustainable way, and the Green Area Ratio is a great way to bring structures to life and give them a higher environmental value.
As defined by the Department of Energy and Environment (n.d.), the Green Area Ratio, or GAR, is a zoning regulation for environmentally sustainable landscape and site design. The effects of the GAR include reduction of storm runoff, improved air quality, and keeping the area cool (Department of Energy and Environment, n.d.).There are many ways to carry out the inclusion of green spaces in the construction process, and the specific landscaping practices are chosen depending on the type of structure (Cidlowski, 2011). Some examples of environmental landscaping suggested by the District of Columbia Office of Planning include turf grass, un-vegetated permeable pavement, vegetated permeable pavement, green roofs, natural ground cover, resin gardens, trees, shrubs, and vegetated walls (Cidlowski, 2011). The way the GAR score is calculated is by adding up landscape elements and dividing them by the area of the lot. These elements are measured by the number of trees, size of green roof or rain garden, the number of plants, soil depths, among others (Cidlowski, 2011). This system is meant to improve urban landscaping while giving developers and designers flexibility (Cidlowski, 2011). Property Improvement Enterprises is considering all these options to make urban areas more sustainable and enhance the living experience of our properties.
To get a closer look at how landscaping practices can be implemented in city structures, this blog post will be exploring green roofing. A green roof is pretty much what it sounds like: a structure that has vegetation as part of the roof (Rabe, 2013). Some cities in the United States that are already applying green roofs include Berkeley CA, Chicago IL, Boston MA, and even Baltimore MD (Rabe, 2013). The benefits of green roofs are improved water quality through filtration, stormwater management, heat reduction of the area, reduced noise level, increased roof life through protection, thermal insulation, and aesthetic benefits (Rabe, 2013). The application of green roofs is a multi-layered system. First, the vegetation is pre-grown in trays. Then, the root barrier, drain mat, water retention fleece, growing medium, and any other desired layers are placed on the roof. Lastly, the pre-vegetated mat is laid over the surface (Rabe, 2013). The selected vegetation usually has low growth height, rapid spread, high drought tolerance, fibrous roots, and no special irrigation or nutrition requirements (Rabe, 2013). The objective of these criteria is to make the green roof as protective and low-maintenance as possible (Rabe, 2013).
Join us in our journey to creating a greener city and a better living standard for D.C. residents. Keep posted for Property Improvement Enterprises’ green area designs.