Landscape Architect Articles

Questions About Greenroofs and Wind11-22-06 | News

Questions About Greenroofs and Wind

Green roof designer must consider wind uplift issues: wind zone, topography, building orientation, surrounding buildings impact, edge type and detailing, building height, etc.

Ralph Velasquez is a specialist at Tremco, Inc., reporting to greenroofs.com about the October meeting of the American Society for the Testing of Materials (ASTM) task force. He notes that while there are many standards already in place for roof design regarding wind uplift, there are no codes or guides specific to wind uplift for vegetative roof design in the U.S.

He asks some interesting questions:

How does one properly design and install a vegetative roof that will not blow off or be displaced?
How are building height, location and orientation dealt with in vegetative design? Does the soil need to be restrained and how is that best achieved?
Is there liability to the building owner if something blows off and there are not codes in place?
What about who installs the soil?
If the roofing contractor installs it, is he responsible?
Should a landscape firm install it?
Can the landscape firm get properly insured in a roofing environment to place the soil?
What if some of the soil or plant material goes airborne and hits a building, a window or a pedestrian?

More at: greenroofs.com/astm_editor.htm.