As communities grapple with issues such as stormwater management, flooding, urban heat loads, and air quality issues, learn about the numerous services provided by green infrastructure that improve the quality of life, resilience, and environmental and human health in communities.
At the macro level of planning, incorporating, and protecting natural areas, wetlands, stream and river corridors, unique habitats, trails, and forest canopy can begin to address issues of flooding, water quality, and air pollution while providing residents access to natural areas for recreation and human health improvements. When focusing on the micro level, green infrastructure features such as bio-swales, porous paving, tree plantings, green roofs, green parking lots, and rainwater capture address main of the same issues but at the local home and neighborhood level, creating healthy, livable places within the community and bringing nature home.
A common feature of communities is parking lots, which cover acres upon acres of land with impervious asphalt to facilitate our overuse of the automobile, and it is becoming a dominant landscape feature in many communities. They contribute to the urban heat island, which elevates temperatures in communities and has an impact on water quality and stormwater runoff that degrade our streams and rivers. They can also detract from community character and affect pedestrian and driver safety.
Green parking lots can reverse those trends by creating a landscape that not only improves the aesthetics and safety of a site but also intercepts stormwater runoff, allows infiltration, shades parked cars and paved surfaces, and promotes evapotranspiration to cool the surrounding environment.
This webinar will discuss planning for and incorporating green infrastructure on the macro and micro scale in Pennsylvania communities as well as learn about the Montgomery County Planning Commission Sustainable Green Parking Lot work.