The Living Building Phipps Conservatory and Botanical Gardens Center for Sustainable Landscape in Pittsburgh is a great example of what following the Five-Star Method results in: An asphalt lot transformed into a highly functioning, beautiful ecosystem which supports endemic wildlife in the area and also contributes to other sustainability outcomes such as wastewater treatments and stormwater management:
☀"Prior to construction, the site selected for the Phipps Center for Sustainable Landscapes (CSL) was a 2.6-acre asphalt lot containing an obsolete Pittsburgh Department of Public Works storage facility and service yard.
Project crews stripped the asphalt before carefully removing abandoned utility lines and vaults, and repurposing defunct underground tanks to collect spillover water from CSL’s sanitary system. The site soil was improved to support a range of ecosystems appropriate to the varying topography adjacent to the building.
In addition to an extensive green roof, 1.5-acres of open meadows transitioning to oak woodlands, as well as water’s edge and wetland host over 150 species of native plants. Rain gardens planted with native species help retain and infiltrate rainwater, and the wetlands are a central component of the wastewater treatment system.
The diverse plantings provide food, shelter and nesting opportunities to endemic wildlife and also help link the site’s landscape to neighboring 450-acre Schenley Park, Pittsburgh’s second-largest green space." ☀
You can learn more about SER and download the Standard here : https://www.ser.org/page/SERStandards
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