Of course we need more green space in our urban environments. Rooftop gardens have been around for a long time. They use valuable space to provide aesthetic and amenity for users. They provide the same functionality as gardens do on the ground. As per good garden’s they costs a considerable sum and even more with access costs to the roof. Building needs to be engineered for this purpose, usually with a minimum of 350kg/M2, with larger trees much more.
There is another alternative to consider with much lower costs and calculated ecosystem services performance.
Huf-Haus lightweight green roof design
Greenroofs can and are often built with specific purposes in mind. Stormwater management, reduced city heat and insulation are accurately calculated. Specialised software is available based on your green roof location, worldwide. They are light weight and reduce the buildings engineering costs. Greenroofs can weight as little as 60kg/M2 but commonly 100-200kg/M2. The weight needs to be calculated when fully saturated to ensure the building is designed correctly. Green roofs with their lightweight, less materials also are much cheaper to install. You can expect to cover 2-10 times the area for the same cost, they can also be installed with an instant full cover of plants.
This photo shows how you can combine a rooftop garden with a Greenroof. The upper roof is a light weight structure covered with plants. The surrounding area is a rooftop garden with seating and viewing area. This provides almost 100% green infrastructure on this site, with the associated exosystem services of water management and cooling.
This green roof is a specialised design to provide Stormwater detention, saving additional costs of tanks.
In Europe and the USA, Greenroofs are very popular. There has been a great deal of research into Greenroof performance. Thermal imaging, regulations that appreciate the benefits of green roofs have dramatically reduced costs for building owners. More green roofs are being built and citizens are the real beneficiary.
Greenroof systems need to provide excellent growing conditions for plants in a thin layer. System like Urbanscape are specially designed for this purpose. Plant species need to be carefully selected. Currently I am working with Western Sydney University on Stormwater management. Landscape Architect Clouston Associates has commissioned Evolvement on a unique green roof trial using air conditioning condensate to water green roofs. This saves water whilst cooling our hottest suburbs. My work developing a comprehensive plant pallet for Australia has found some interesting native plants for use in lightweight roofs too.
Australian native lightweight green roof with only 65mm Growing media over 20mm Urbanscape.
Installing 600M2 of 20mm Urbanscape growing media to improve performance on this light weight greenroof in Sydney.
Please free to contact me for the design of you green roof system. Robert Griffith +61 468 787 071.