SEND’s Roof Goes Green

By: Erin Brown

Stormwater run-off, beware. SEND is on your trail, and will cut down on the damage you are doing to our neighborhood.

Thanks to a generous grant by United Water, Inc., the Southeast Neighborhood Development office, located at 1030 Orange Street will soon have a more environmentally friendly and welcoming roof. Over the next few months, work will begin to install a LiveRoof green roof. The employees at SEND are even getting certified by LiveRoof to become installers so that they can oversee the work on the building themselves. With the help of neighborhood volunteers SEND hopes to be able to install the entire roof in the course of one day.

In addition to the actual plant-life, SEND plans to build a deck on the roof to provide a space to enjoy the new greenery and to use as a space for educating other property owners who are interested in doing a similar project in their own space. SEND also hopes to be able to reuse existing materials to build access to the roof, which currently does not exist, to continue with the sustainable theme. The green roof will help prevent run-off which in turn created less polluted waters in our storm sewers, which is helpful while we still have a combined sewer overflow system which drains storm water into our creeks. The roof will also help relieve the Urban Heat Island effect, which keeps the hot, asphalt-covered city center (where we are located) degrees above surrounding areas.

The building at 1030 Orange Street was previously the boiler house for the carburetor factory which has since become the Wheeler Arts Community, and therefore already stands as an example of green or sustainable concepts. SEND hopes that this project sends a strong message to the community how sustainability can be integrated into existing structures, and how continued work on existing structures improves the neighborhood.