Last week, Chicago officials held a ribbon-cutting ceremony on “the greenest street in America,” a two-mile stretch of Cermak Road and Blue Island Avenue in the city’s Pilsen neighborhood. In addition to new pedestrian and bicycle features, the innovative new street surface will filter stormwater, helping to prevent the city’s combined sewers from overflowing. Most impressive of all, the cement used to pave the street cleans the surface of the roadway and removes pollution from the air.

Read the rest of Chicago Unveils the “Greenest Street in America” with Permeable, Smog-Eating Pavement

Permalink | Add to del.icio.us | digg
Post tags: Benito Juarez Community Academy, Benito Juarez High School, bioswales, Blue Island, CDOT, Cermak Road, chicago, Chicago Department of Transportation, green infrastructure, permeable pavement, photocatalytic cement, rain gardens

Let’s be clear – paving a surface does not reduce storm water run-off, but if you must create a street, parking lot, driveway, or any other form of this detriment, an apples-to-apples comparison between pervious concrete and asphalt paving will show many exciting benefits from this innovative form of paving. First of all, those little air pockets mean less material overall, and with the cost of oil as unstable as the resource itself, petroleum-based asphalt is no longer the cheapest form of paving. For the first time in history, the cost of concrete and asphalt have reached comparable dollar values. Add in the cost of additional storm water management devices – grids of piping directed towards drains and retention ponds, and suddenly permeable concrete starts making a lot more sense. Then there is the environmental cost of leaching toxic chemicals, such as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) used as a sealcoat on asphalt, into what should be nature’s flow of water back to the ground table.

Read the rest of Holey Concrete: Pervious Paving Reduces Stormwater Run-off

Permalink | Add to del.icio.us | digg
Post tags: green building strategies pervious pavement, green design, green landscaping, permeable pavement, rainwater runoff, stormwater run-off, sustainable design