Ed Dreiband claims to be afraid of heights, yet here he is, some twenty-five feet up, standing on the roof of his newly built Northwest Honda dealership in Owings Mills, looking like the king of the world.
From this vantage point high above busy Reisterstown Road, Dreiband can survey all 28,500 square feet of the building’s innovative “green roof,” made of living, growing plants. The green roof is the centerpiece of Northwest Honda’s eco-friendly auto facility, which opened in August.
“The plants have grown some since my last visit,” says Dreiband, who led this reporter on a semi-perilous climb up a narrow, indoor ladder, before opening a steel hatch that leads onto the roof.
Dreiband walks gingerly, careful not to tread upon neatly manicured rows of tiny plants—some 57,000 in all—that nearly cover the roof. “They don’t really require much work,” Dreiband explains. “When it rains, they’re watered. That’s what’s so great about this—the environmental benefits and the practicality.”
Green roofs are vegetated covers where growing plants replace traditional roofing materials. Experts like Garth Rockcastle, dean of the School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation at the University of Maryland, College Park, say they’re gaining favor as a smart, sustainable design trend.
“For the past fifteen years [in college architecture programs] there’s been an evolution in terms of teaching more ‘green’ concepts,” says Rockcastle. “Today, it’s considered standard.”
The need and the demand for eco-friendly construction have increased due to factors such as global warming, higher rates of air and water pollution, and a growing population. Green roofs can help lessen urban development and suburban sprawl issues, while creating environmental, economic, and aesthetic benefits.
Environmentally, the myriad benefits include reduced effects on the ozone, fewer toxins in drinking water, and improved air quality. While green roofs usually entail higher initial costs, their economic advantages typically include decreased energy usage and utility costs (particularly in heating and cooling). Among the aesthetic benefits are visually pleasing native and naturalized plantcommunities.
Dreiband says he first read about eco-friendly construction in USA Today and Ward’s DealerBusiness, a trade publication for car dealers. He and his wife, Ina, also own BMW and Suzuki dealerships, all along the 9700 block of Reisterstown Road.
“When we began working on the new building, I asked our architect about it,” says the 62-year-old accountant turned car dealer, whose two sons Josh and Danny help him manage a team of two hundred. “We found out that we could do it, and went from there.”
Architects Peter Powell and Rob Gordon of Beck, Powell & Parsons in Towson designed the new $12 million facility, set on four acres that formerly housed Baltimore County police department offices. (The land was purchased from the county in 2001 and the groundbreaking occurred in January 2006.)
The new building replaces the old Northwest Honda site across the street (which will be used to expand the family’s BMW dealership), and is designed to preserve energy and utilize recycled materials in a variety of ways.
“[Dreiband] has always had an interest in energy conservation, both as an environmental concern and a cost-saving measure,” says Powell. “We’d done residential and commercial [green] buildings, but never a green roof on a commercial building. It was an exciting project.”
The results are impressive. The sprawling 40,000 -square -foot dealership is painted white with cool blue accents, giving it a light, airy feel. It can accommodate up to five hundred cars.
The building has eighty-seven energy-saving insulated glass panels, and its main heating source comes from furnaces that use recycled oil from cars. Throughout the building, automatic sensors turn lights on and off as people enter and exit rooms; meanwhile, exterior lights are controlled by so-called “photoeyes” that turn lights on based on the percentage of available light, and turn them off based on time clocks to reduce unnecessary usage.
To service cars, there are twenty-nine vehicle bays in the service center, and the dealership’s on-premise carwash recycles water between washes—about 2,500 to 3,000 gallons daily.
As for the building’s green roof—which actually has what architect Rob Gordon describes as a “thermo-plastic polyolefin membrane (TPO) roof” underneath to keep the interior of the building dry—it is a blend of both form and function. For starters, the green roof extends the life of a traditional roof, according to the lead architects, who collaborated on the project with landscape architect Thomas J. Hoff (who secured the approval from Baltimore County to install the green roof), various engineers, builders, county officials, and others.
Having multiple layers protects the TPO roofing membrane from ultraviolet rays, wind, and the extremes of temperature fluctuations. “The green roof keeps the TPO cooler, and this reduces the ‘heat island effect’ of a black roof, which would otherwise contribute to global warming,” explains Powell.
The green roof also meets the county’s required storm water management system requirements, says Robert Alexander Wirth, a professional engineer and manager of storm water engineering for the county’s Department of Environmental Protection and Resource Management.
“When you disturb more than five thousand square feet [of land], you are required to address storm water management,” he explains. “Because of site constraints, such as clay soil under the ground, they had to come up with an alternative storm water practice. There’s a whole menu of items you can choose—from a storm water retention pond to underground facilities. They chose to do this green roof.”
Wirth says according to the plans submitted to the county, estimates were that the roof would cost a little under $400,000.
A green roof typically has drought-tolerant plants (in this case, most are a hardy species known as sedum in six different varieties) that help reduce, filter, and cool storm water run-off. That in turn can protect sewer systems and watersheds, and help prevent potentially hazardous levels of toxins from entering waterways such as the Chesapeake Bay and affecting food sources like fish.
While Dreiband says safety and insurance issues preclude the public and customers from going up to the roof, the project has garnered positive attention for the dealership. Besides being what Wirth called “unique” in Baltimore County, it may also be the first Honda operation nationwide with such design elements, according to company officials in Torrance, California.
“It is certainly one of the first to incorporate so many environmental facility features into the overall design philosophy of the dealership,” says Chris Martin, a spokesman for American Honda Motor Co., Inc.
“We’re thrilled about the new building and the chance to operate in an environmentally conscious manner,” says Dreiband, who resists labeling himself an “environmentalist.”
“I can’t take care of the whole world, but this makes me feel good. I have grandchildren, and many of the people on my team have children. We want to leave them a healthy environment. We only have one earth. We all share it.”
