Civil engineers visit Pringle Creek

The Capital Branch local section of the American Society of Civil Engineers held a field trip and meeting at Pringle Creek Community on May 24.
A group of 30 engineers, led by President Ken Roley (who is with the City of Salem Public Works), celebrated their 10 year anniversary and presented a a lifetime achievement award to member Ken Archibald, who started his career in civil engineering in 1958. Congratulations, Mr. Archibald.

The meeting included an overview of Pringle Creek by Don Myers. That was followed by Chuck Gregory of W&H Pacific (which created the asphalt mix for Pringle Creek), who did a very interesting presentation on the entire porous street system from an engineer’s technical perspective--soil compaction, rock size, flow and absorption rates, and also the step by step process, innovations, and lessons learned.

So, why porous roadways? Pervious concrete and asphalt mimic the natural environment by capturing falling rain, filtering and absorbing it, and recharging the aquifer. This is important because not only does the City need ground water in the summer for human use, wildlife relies on a steady flow of groundwater that is slowly released into watersheds throughout the year, which keeps the streams cool, clean and at normal levels. Porous roadways (and rain gardens) act as giant, spread-out sand filters and phytoremediation (plants + pollution removal) centers for cleaning stormwater on the way to the aquifer. It slows things down and allows bacteria to break down or absorb pollutants.

Conventional impermeable road surfaces, on the other hand, collect non-point source pollution on the road surface--oil and coolant off our cars, heavy metals, like copper dust off brake pads, particulates that settle on the road surface, mercury, spilled gasoline from the mower, you name it--and, then after a storm event carries all that junk directly to our waterways in one big dose of poison. The rapidity of the drainage increases erosion and sediment turbidity. This is a bad deal for fish or wildlife, like crossing a toxic waste dump in a thick haze of smog. Or like swimming through a toilet. In 1999, Salem spilled 127 million gallons of sewage into the Willamette River, mostly after heavy rainfall overwhelmed the system. The Willamette is #3 on the 2006 Most Endangered American Rivers list, thanks mainly to toxic mixing zones, but not helped any by sewer overflows I’m sure.

Pringle Creek Community has the largest neighborhood porous street system in the country. Having engineers, developers, contractors and people who are involved with water quality come out to see our project will hopefully help start a sea change on how streets are made.

--santiago

Envision Oregon town hall meeting in Salem

Here is a chance to be heard: Envision Oregon is a series of town hall meetings. The purpose is to stimulate public comment about how Oregonians should plan for the next 30 years. Pringle Creek Community is a local partner. The Salem event is June 7, to be held at Mission Mill Museum.

The Salem meeting will be "welcomed" by Rep. Vicki Berger; the hosts are Jefferson Smith of The Bus Project and Bob Stacey of 1000 Friends of Oregon. The topics for this meeting are:
Family farms and forests
Fairness in land use

Dr. Michael Mann at Loucks on Thursday

This is the final Friends of Straub Environmental Learning Center lecture of the 2006-07 season. It is Global Climate Change: Past and Present by Dr. Michael Mann. The lecture is Thursday, May 31, 7 p.m., at Loucks Auditorium, Salem Public Library.

Dr. Michael Mann is a member of the faculty in the Departments of Meteorology and Geosciences and the Earth and Environmental Systems Institute at Penn State. He was a lead author of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Third Scientific Assessment Report. Dr. Mann's many awards include selection as one of Scientific American's 50 leading visionaries in science and technology.

In this presentation, Dr. Mann will review the solid evidence of human influence on the climate in recent decades and explore the impacts of human-induced climate change on the United States. The presentation is free and open to the public with support from the Marion Soil and Water Conservation District, the Spirit Mountain Community Fund, Confederated Tribes of the Siletz Indians, Salem Electric, and the City of Salem.

More good Statesman Journal coverage

A wonderful large spread from the Salem Statesman Journal, focused on the energy- and resource-efficiency of the homes at Pringle Creek Community: Project reflects push for efficiency. This "idea house" is loaded with smart innovations and environmental features.

I think there is a little bit of a sea change now," said Mark Kogut of Opsis Architecture. "There are a lot of people looking for less in size and more in quality."

Over the home's lifetime, owners can expect to pay significantly less in energy bills than their counterparts in a conventional home.

The model cottage house is expected to perform more than 35 percent better than homes built to Oregon's building code and 50 percent better than federal building codes.

"Energy is the big footprint of a house over its lifetime," said Christopher Dymond of the Oregon Department of Energy. "The bulk (of homes) are built to bare minimum code. Ten percent are going to Energy Star and Earth Advantage levels. But this home, this is the top 1 percent of performance."

Bald eagles fly over Pringle Creek

Hard to believe, but a pair of bald eagles circled over Pringle Creek Community this afternoon. It was quite the sight. The camera was all the way in the office, so instead of running to go and fumble around with it we just watched them soar. A group of foresters from the OR Department of Forestry spotted them while admiring the giant Kitalpas by the greenhouses.

Thus far in the month of May we have seen onsite a Red Tail hawk regularly (one time with a snake in its talons heading back to the nest), a covey of Quail (eight of them scampering around), a number of fat Oregon Gray Squirrels, several Morning Doves, and about five Killdeers that have nested–-their offspring having already hatched and flown away.

Click here for some interesting information on Killdeers. They are a remarkable bird: their nests of perfectly camouflaged eggs blend into a hidden declivity they’ve made in gravel. They are precocial, which allows them to get up and go right upon hatching. They have this crazy trait of drawing predators away from the nests by flopping around like an injured bird.

We are also frequently visited by a Great Blue Heron that quietly arrives in the late afternoon, cruising through the canopy that shades Pringle Creek as if it were a dark green tunnel. The heron is elusive and shy, so no good pictures yet, but below is a photo of the part of the creek where he hangs out.

--santiago

It's all relative

Very impressive, the blogging being done by Alan Durning, founder of Sightline Institute. He has a great post about the use of bicycles for transportation on Sightline’s blog, the Daily Score.

The good news: Portland, Eugene and Corvallis are relatively very bike-friendly. That's compared to the rest of the United States. Portland and Corvallis are in the top eight U.S. cities; Eugene is in the next 12. Oregon leads the other 49 states in the number of bike-commuters.

The bad news: the numbers are tiny. Portland (inside the city limits) is only 2.6 percent of commute trips by bicycle. Greater Portland is 0.8 percent--the suburbs are no better than Salem, and I can tell you from my five senses that Salem has about 500 cars on the road for every bicyclist. Corvallis is better at 8 percent of trips--I wonder how many of those are students going to class.

The Netherlands, 38 percent (Amsterdam almost 50 percent); Denmark, 20 percent (Copenhagen almost 50 percent). When the price of petroleum jumps to twice what it is today, those countries are going to continue functioning pretty well. The USA will be reeling. Of course, those who live at Pringle Creek will have advantages, like being close to the city center, being on a transit line, having a store. Pringle Creek will do okay relatively.

Somewhere outside the U.S.

Simply green chic

I’m not going to reveal who sent me the link to a post on styleist.com, "Going ‘Green’ with Style." Frankly, I had no idea Tony my friend read the fashion blogs. But this particular post is right on, with good tips on reducing, reusing, recycling, like this:

Don't over-wash clothes. The heat, water, soap, along with all the twisting and scrunching, stresses fabric. Wash when there's visible dirt; air clothes out and spot-clean to keep them fresh between washings. Go for cooler rather than hot water whenever possible. The new cold-water detergents work well, are gentler on fabrics, save energy and greenhouse gases -- and save on your bills.

The other library

Salem has a fine public library. The whole Civic Center - library - Pringle Parkade - Pringle Tower project, done in the early 1970s, seems like it was good planning. At that time, the cost of a big public library probably seemed excessive. I don't think the library was very busy during the early years. Have you been there lately? It’s a busy place.

The Project for Public Spaces website has a whole series of articles about Why Libraries Matter More Than Ever:

The creation of the "information superhighway" threatened to make libraries obsolete, but today they are as prominent as ever. Libraries are taking on a larger civic role, redefining themselves as community centers for the 21st Century. The old model of the library was the inward-focused "reading room," the new one is more like a community "front porch."

Meet the Wilsons

Introducing Alan and Sue Wilson, who will be among the earliest homeowners at Pringle Creek Community. Alan owns a local landscape maintenance company and Sue is an administrator for the State of Oregon.

Alan Wilson and grandson Avery: “It’s all about future generations,” says Alan.

Says Sue, "We’re excited to be part of the Pringle Community. We think it’s important to have a smaller “footprint” ourselves with an energy efficient home. It’s only in recent years that we’ve expanded our knowledge about green building and green communities and we think that this place is going to be a great example for others to follow. There is so much that is innovative here. We’ve chosen to to build a ‘tall-house.’ The floor plan has been very well thought out and it gives us everything we need. We can’t wait to start building. And more importantly, we know the community itself offers tremendous potential.”

Thank you, Alan and Sue. They promise to keep us posted on their experience with green building and being part of Pringle Creek.

The other Illahee

Illahee is a Portland non-profit environmental organization that provides "opportunities for science-based policy-relevant environmental inquiry." They bring some excellent lecturers to Portland. Coming up is Thomas Homer-Dixon. We have talked about him before. He is an author and Director of the Trudeau Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies at the University of Toronto.

September 11th won't be the last time we walk out of our cities, writes Thomas Homer-Dixon. In his new book, The Upside of Down, he argues that peak oil, climate change, terrorism, and the widening gap between rich and poor have made the world increasingly vulnerable to breakdown.

But it is also ripe for renewal. Although recent disasters have caused tremendous suffering, they have taught us how we can reinvigorate the economic, political and social systems that sustain us. Can capitalism provide for the world's well-being, equity and environment in the 21st century? Yes, says Homer-Dixon, if we think creatively, act boldly and develop resilient societies in advance.

"In advance" makes that a pretty big if. It will be interesting. Anyway, admission is $20, ouch, for non-members. It's Wednesday, May 23, 7:30 p.m. in the First Congregational Church, 1126 SW Park Ave., Portland.