As Kaiser continues to build buildings, they continue to push for greener and greener ideas to bring to construction. Their current project in Modesto is no exception to this thought. They have placed many green ideas into this $462 million dollar project. One of the most notable pieces of infrastructure is the pervious pavement parking.
A pervious pavement parking lot is almost identical to most regular pavements, but they do not put in the finer particles that would close up any gaps in the pavement before laying the asphalt over it. By not using the smaller aggregate particulates they allow the pavement to be more open to allow for the water to seep through and be filtered out before the water reaches the ground.
Kaiser went about putting in 4,400 tons of pervious pavement in. The process used during the construction first started with a fabric filter then overlaid with a perforated pipe in order to distribute water evenly throughout the entire pavement system. After the pipe they then laid a 2 inch thick layer that constituted a rough washed aggregate and then covered it with an asphalt cover.
The reason I was drawn to this article was the fact that I had heard of using an open gradation asphalt on highways where there is a lot of moisture as a means to help reduce possible hydroplaning. I had not thought of using this same idea as a means of explicitly using it as a water runoff and treatment approach. I am curious to know if this is something that could feasibly be used as a way to reduce water run-off on all projects that use asphalt.
Article: http://www.lexisnexis.com.proxy.library.oregonstate.edu/hottopics/lnacademic/?
this sounds very interesting, my question after reading this is, does after a long time, a period of several years. A plant seed goes by, does it cause growth underneath the pavement and crack the pavement. I know it may be an unlikely chance, but during pollination time, there are a lot of plant seeds flying around.
ReplyDeleteIf it does grow, we may have a harder time controlling weed growth on the pavement as well as dish out extra money to exterminate them, and that would be more poisonous to the environment.