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Urbanite Harvesting
- Posted by arif on April 15th, 2007 filed in Concrete ("Urbanite") Reuse, Musings
Mark Lakeman, the visionary architect and founder of City Repair mentioned to me that he is excited about this Depave project because it will provide more broken concrete (AKA urbanite) for use as foundations for strawbale construction and other natural buildings. This got me thinking that perhaps depaving should instead be known as urbanite harvesting. Cement production is one of the most energy intensive of all manufacturing processes that exist. Its production results in especially high emissions of CO 2, nitrous oxide, sulphur, and other pollutants.
So, go out there and harvest some urbanite for reuse, while it’s cheap and plentiful! Maybe you can stock up on it, in case it becomes cost-prohibitive to produce more new concrete. The stuff can be used for retaining walls, stepping stones, raised bed gardens, firepits, and sculpture. If you have more creative uses for the stuff, let me know!
5 Responses to “Urbanite Harvesting”
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April 16th, 2007 at 12:56 pm
The site looks beautiful!!
Did you test your soil before planting? I’d be worried the soil would be contaminated with lead/oil/yucky and dangerous stuff.
The retaining wall pictures look amazing-I never thought it would look so cool!!
April 17th, 2007 at 12:05 pm
Depaving is a great way to bring back more of that good old fashion rainwater INFILTRATION!
Recycling more urbanite is also a great way to reduce the need for aggregate mining is energy intensive and can rip the heart out of local natural areas… Ross Island being the most notable local example.
Thanks CIty Repair (and Arif) for depave.org!
Jim Labbe
Urban Conservationist
Audubon Society of Portland
April 17th, 2007 at 1:38 pm
Two excellent depaving examples in Portland: The DaVinci Garden at Davinci middle school which used to be a tennis court and Tom McCall Park which used to be a street.
Many school yards in Portland are completely asphalted over. Please don’t forget to mention asphalt in your musings.
April 18th, 2007 at 7:25 am
Jenni,
Soil testing is always a good idea. With the asphalt covereed areas, i planted native ornamental plants. I have my edibles planted in the concrete areas, as concrete seems to not affect soil health (see the how-to section). As far as lead, the most common source is house paint, and i like to think that my paved yard was protected from that yucky stuff!
Gretchen,
Thanks. We are actually looking at helping out with the depaving of blacktop at two schools in Portland!
April 25th, 2007 at 7:12 am
excellent site for what i hope will become a nationwide phenomenon. i have always looked at how much paved areas we have in our built environments and cringed. so much land to be reclaimed for anything other than parking lots, roads etc.