In February, the U.S. Forest Service published a report indicating that cities around the country are losing around 4 million trees per year. Of the 20 cities included in the study, 17 showed significant losses of canopy cover, and 16 showed significant increases in impervious hardscape (or paved surfaces that don’t absorb water). At the same time,… More
This picture is of the Venice Island Recreation Center, in the Manayunk neighborhood of Philadelphia, PA. The island sits between the Manayunk Canal and the Schuylkill River and between the Lock and Cotton Street. And in about three months, Silva Cells will be installed here. It will be the first usage of this product by… More
A combined sewer overflow (CSO) – the “the discharge of wastewater and stormwater from a combined sewer system directly into a river, stream, lake or ocean” – sounds bad enough. But have you ever seen one?
We love this sign from Western Pennsylvania Conservancy, Treevitalize, and Highmark outside our installation at Fifth Avenue Place (Highmark). The Silva Cells went in the ground in November 2011.
This post is by Bill Spiewak, an arborist in Santa Barbara, CA, and originally appeared on his blog, Treemendous. Last month in my arboriculture class, I may have implied to my students that this instructor is falling off the deep end. I asked them to stand and assume the yoga position, tree pose. My objective… More
We’ll be hosting our next webinar, timed for our UK/Europe audience, on how to lay out the Silva Cell using AutoCAD next Wednesday, April 25th at 3pm GMT. Anyone is welcome to register, but for those of you in North America, it will mean an early start time.
Phytoremediation is the use of green plants and their associated microorganisms to stabilize or reduce inorganic and organic contamination in soils and surfacewater or groundwater. In other words, the process of using trees and other plants as biological filters. It is also a key component of what we mean when we talk about ecosystem services… More
Many designers understand the need for the Silva Cell and support it as an effective design tool for tree growth and stormwater management in urban environments. Yet, all too often it gets value engineered out of projects for being too pricey. While cheaper than creating a custom suspended pavement system, and actually money-saving in the long-term,… More
Trees are effortlessly artful. This artfulness may be part of why they have such a calming and restorative effect on people and can elicit such powerful emotional attachment. Trees are also functional infrastructure. You can debate which role is more valuable, but from an economic standpoint, infrastructure usually wins hands-down. That’s one reason why recent… More
Last month’s Landscape Architecture Magazine had an interesting feature by Mike Singer. The article, titled “Are We Done Yet? Measuring for a project’s success is keeping clients and designers engaged well after installation,” explores an emerging trend in the field: extended contract periods to address the long-term success and performance of the site’s landscape.
Three magazines recently included articles about projects that incorporated Silva Cells in their green infrastructure plans.
I’m going to start a new mini-featurette on the blog, which I’m calling “Big Tree, Little Tree.” Just side-by-side pictures of dramatically different-sized trees, highlighting the effect each creates on a streetscape. These were both taken in San Francisco’s Mission district. The little guy was in especially bad shape for at least one obvious reason.
Soil. Stormwater. Sustainable Infrastructure.
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