Greening BC Skylines Together...
Time flies when you’re having fun, and that’s definitely true for the green roof movement!
From November 6-9, several GRIN board members will attend the 20th anniversary of the first green roof conference on these lands. This post celebrates the decades of experience and commitment inherent in our board, while stoking the coals for Cities Alive 2024, hosted in Toronto by Green Roofs for Healthy Cities (GRHC).
GRINning down memory lane
Some of GRIN’s board of directors attended that first conference in May 2003, which explains why the board has over 160 years’ collective experience working with green roofs. Here, we profile those who will be present at Cities Alive in Toronto. Please make a point of saying hello!
Our Executive Director, Dr. Christine Thuring, will be will be easy to find in Toronto: she is helping at the registration desk, will attend the Industry Pioneers Gala, and everything in between! In addition to the first Chicago conference, in 2001 Christine attended the first green roof demonstration launch at Toronto City Hall.
By the time of the Chicago conference, Christine had completed a 3-month green roof internship in Germany and was about to start her Master’s at the Penn State Centre for Green Roof Research with David Beattie and Robert Berghage (one of the first green roof Master’s in America). Also in Chicago, she met Stephan Brenneisen, the Swiss researcher who established that green roofs can support red-listed species and biodiversity. Straight after her graduation (2005), Christine helped Stephan organize the first World Green Roof Congress in Basel (the dual-citizen’s Swiss hometown is just south of Basel Stadt).
Christine came to Vancouver in 2006 to join the Centre for the Advancement of Green Roof Ecology at British Columbia Institute of Technology (BCIT) by Dr. Maureen Connelly‘s invitation. Christine organized experiential green roof activities for the UN World Urban Festival, which took place near the Green Roof Research Facility. She joined the team at NATS Nursery, who grew the plants for the Vancouver Convention Centre, and California Academy of Sciences. From 2009-2018, Christine led several Green Roof Safaris with Joerg Breuning, and did her PhD at the University of Sheffield with Nigel Dunnett.
GRIN Board Member Dr. Karen Liu is another green roof pioneer in Canada who will be at the Toronto conference. Karen is the Green Roof Specialist with Next Level Stormwater Management (NLSM). On Fri. Nov 8th (10:25-12:25), she will moderate a panel discussion, “Best Practices in Green Roof Installation and Maintenance” and on Thursday Nov 7th (11:40-12:10) she will give a talk, “SpongeBaseTM: Add SWM Capabilities Under Hardscape Rooftop Amenity Space“.
Karen began her green roof journey over 20 years ago at the National Research Council in Ottawa where she established the first field research facility in Canada to study engineering performance of green roofs. She moved to Vancouver in 2006 and expanded her green roof research and taught at BCIT before continuing her green roof journey in the private sector in Europe, Asia and North America. Find Karen at all the Cities Alive events and drop by the NLSM booth to say hi!
GRIN’s Treasurer, Holly Horne, will also be at the Toronto conference. Find her/ Gingko colleagues at booth #101 in the exhibition hall. Holly is Head of Design & Project Manager / Estimator with Gingko Sustainability. Holly got involved with green roofs in the early 2000’s through Landscape Architecture, where she focused her thesis on rooftop agriculture. After graduating, she gained international experience working in Taiwan and the UK before returning to Toronto to amass over 15 years of commercial landscape experience.
As a licensed Landscape Architect and Green Roof Professional, for the last 7 years Holly has collaborated on many installation and maintenance projects in Ontario and British Columbia. In 2022, Ginkgo took over maintenance many extensive green roofs on the Vancouver Olympic Village. Having removed the grasses, small trees and blackberry and cleared the roof drains of debris (after many years of neglect), her team’s monthly visits keep this roof in good shape.
GRIN’s Secretary, Josh Stewart, is a force of positivity and creativity on the GRIN board. For the past three years, he has become an increasingly important part of our community through his role as SOPRANATURE Technical Representative at Soprema Canada. He is scheduled to speak on the impact of rooftop amenity space on individuals and communities on Thursday November 7th at 5:10pm.
Josh’s background in environmental studies and planning first brought him to the green roof world. He is also a living architecture subject matter expert, and is pursuing his MBA in Sustainable Innovation at the University of Victoria (while working full-time!).
Although he won’t attend the Toronto conference, we’d be remiss not to mention that GRIN Member-at-Large, Randy Sharp, attended that first Chicago conference in 2003, where he presented his work designing and installing the first living wall in the region, at the Vancouver Aquarium. During his stellar career with Sharp & Diamond Landscape Architecture, he championed some major living architecture projects, including the Vancouver International Airport (YVR), the Seymour Filtration Plant (Metro Vancouver), Broadway Tech Centre (Bentall Kennedy/Quad Real), and the Delbrook Community Recreation Centre in North Vancouver. In 2023, Randy was honoured with a Lifetime Achievement Award from GRHC.
See you at Cities Alive?
Cities Alive promises to be an exceptional experience. This multi-disciplinary conference will be held in the vibrant city of Toronto, spotlighting pioneering green roof designs, deep dives into green infrastructure policy and programming, and groundbreaking products and services within the green infrastructure industry. The City of Toronto, a North American leader in green infrastructure, now boasts more than 10.7 million square feet of green roofs and counting. Toronto has numerous policies and programs dedicated to other forms of green infrastructure, too, including parks, ravine lands, and forests.
“We are delighted to feature more than 100 expert speakers at this year’s CitiesAlive,” said Steven Peck, GRP, founder and president of Green Roofs for Healthy Cities. “Green infrastructure, or nature based solutions, are gaining ground worldwide as essential approaches to addressing the climate crisis in our cities. CitiesAlive 2024 has something for everyone – landscape architects, architects, engineers, urban planners, politicians, roofing professionals, GRPs, researchers, urban foresters, ENGOs, and students.” he added.
