Green Roof Vancouver Convention Centre, Vancouver, B.C.

Description

In the early 2000s, when the City of Vancouver began planning to remake its convention center from the 1986 World’s Fair Exposition, they set goals to make the new convention center to be a leading model for sustainable development. With the completion of the new West convention center building in April 2009, it remains as the premier example of sustainable civic construction as it is the first double LEED Platinum certified-convention facility in the world. As the concept for the new building began to include a green roof, test plots were established beginning by 2006 to test vegetation, soils, configuration of the setup, and help sell the concept to the client. The 2.4-hectare (6 acres) meadow-roof (Fig. 10.21) was modeled after coastal meadows native to the Pacific Northwest. Since there were no remaining meadows in the Fraser delta, offsite nature preserves served as inspiration for the plant communities. Twenty-four plant species were chosen to begin the establishment phase. Over the decade that these plants have established, and just like in nature, some plants compete to thrive and others have declined. For example, a native aster has completely dominated some of the steepslopes (56% slope) on the green roofs but fills a lesser role elsewhere on the flatter sections (3% slope) of the roof.

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Samenvatting (Dutch description)

Building Owner/Client: City of Vancouver Green Roof Design Team Lead: PWL, Partnership Landscape Architects Inc., Rana Creek Architect: CM/DA+LMN Architects Ecologist: Paul Kephart Installation Contractor: Holland Landscapers/NATS Nursery Maintenance Contractor: City of Vancouver Project completion: April 2009 Green roof area: 2.4 hectares (6 acres)

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climatescan

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