10C — January 31 - February 13, 2014 — Shopping Centers — Mid Atlantic Real Estate Journal
www.marejournal.com
M id A tlantic ICSC C onference & D eal M aking PaveDrain Drainage, stormwater & transportation solution in one
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oday’s paving blocks don’t merely form sur- faces for pedestrians
toward LEED certification. In addition, they don’t raise the temperature of runoff, which can affect the entire ecosystem of a creek. PaveDrain, a permeable articulated concrete block mat system is one such example. The PaveDrain mats can be preassembled in a variety of configurations customized for specific applications and installed very quickly with conventional construction equipment. PaveDrain blocks also can be installed manually at smaller sites. The gaps be- tween the blocks are left open for maximum infiltration of stormwater. In one small residential area in Mount Rainier, MD, stormwater runoff was such a problem that snowmelt from a 2011 snowstorm reached 3 feet deep in the basement of one house and almost reached the fuse box. “We’re an older municipality,” says assistant city manager Michael Jack- son. “We lack storm drains.” The ones the city does have are mainly at the end of each block, where runoff doesn’t reach them. With even 2 or 3 inches of rain, runoff, with its attendant urban pollutants, used to cascade down from the commercial district, flood- ing the dozen homes along 35th and 36th streets, and from there into the Anacostia River and the Chesapeake Bay. When an alley adjacent to the homes and a municipal parking lot above them were paved with asphalt, the prob- lem intensified. “I’d been looking for a solu- tion for about five years, and I kept coming across perme- able pavement,” Jackson says. “One of the biggest problems with putting in storm drains is getting easements. A lot of property owners aren’t willing to do it.” In 2010, he visited a municipality where PaveD- rain Performance Pavement, manufactured and supplied by Ernest Maier Block in Blad- ensburg, MD, was installed. A demonstration with fire trucks spraying water on the blocks showed the water infiltrating almost as fast as the trucks could spray it. Jackson and city manager Jeanelle Wallace decided to use the PaveDrain system to pave both the alley and the parking lot with funds the city had received from the Continued on page 11C
and vehicles and enhance the appearance of the site. Combined with an aggregate base, they become a system with substantial additional benefits. The primary purpose of these paving systems is to allow stormwater to infiltrate the ground, which prevents flooding, traps suspended solids, and filters pollutants. Because they have a cool- ing effect in the summer, in contrast to asphalt, paving block systems can earn credits
Highest Infiltration Rate & Lowest Maintenance of Any Permeable Surface . . .
What does your pavement do for you? www.pavedrain.com Contact: Dan Bishop 202.510.4652|dbishop@emcositesolutions.com Visit PaveDrain at booth # 227 at Mid Atlantic ICSC Show
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