Photo Opportunity of Annual Mowing of Living Roof

It’s that time of year again to mow back a year’s growth on the Vancouver Convention Centre’s six-acre living roof. This is the only formal trimming conducted on the roof each year.

It was another productive year on the roof, notably with very successful growth of the Potentilla and Pearly Everlast plants. The Aster plant reached up to 5.5 feet in certain areas on the roof. The bees living in the four hives on the roof were also busy, producing approximately 80 pounds of wildflower honey this year.

Media are invited to photograph the annual mowing:

Thursday, October 9th
9:30 am
Vancouver Convention Centre West (meet in lobby under globe)
1055 Canada Place

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Annual Mowing Fast Facts

• Takes a crew of six landscapers

• One week to complete

• Equipment: one lawnmower, two weed wackers and one blade trimmer

• Estimated 11,000 pounds of grass and plants will be cut

• No chemical fertilizers, pesticides or herbicides used

• Some clippings will be left on the roof to be composted back into the soil as fertilizer

Living Roof Fast Facts

• Six acres (2.4 hectares)

• Largest green roof in Canada

• Largest non-industrial green roof in North America

• One of the ten largest green roofs in the world (source: Engineering News Record)

• Landscaped with more than 400,000 indigenous plants and grasses from 25 different plant species of the Pacific Northwest

• Irrigated in the summer with water recycled through facility’s black water treatment plant that collects and cleans water from washrooms

• Acts as an insulator, reducing heat gains in the summer and heat losses in the winter