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One of These Things (Is Not Like the Other)

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One of These Things (Is Not Like the Other)

“One of these things is not like the other,” Ernie from Sesame Street said it best.  For those that claim impervious surfaces, such as asphalt and concrete, and pervious surfaces are synonymous, that is not true.  Bay Area Pervious Concrete’s David Liguori went out on the field this week to report on some real-time comparisons between these two surfaces during our most recent storm, and the evidence is striking. 

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Residents Wowed By Pervious Concrete on San Francisco's Holloway Green Street

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Residents Wowed By Pervious Concrete on San Francisco's Holloway Green Street

Recently the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC) and project stakeholders celebrated the completion of the Holloway Green Street at its ribbon cutting ceremony. David Liguori, Bay Area Pervious Concrete's President, joined the celebration and even was invited to hold the ribbon for cutting. Watch videos of the ceremony and pervious concrete demonstration and be wowed along with the rest of the attendees.

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Heavy Fog and Wind, No Problem! Installing Pervious Concrete on a Mountain Top

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Heavy Fog and Wind, No Problem! Installing Pervious Concrete on a Mountain Top

Most of the time in Northern California we enjoy fairly mild weather and sunshine, but it's not always sunny in the Golden State. The San Francisco bay area is known for its fog. This can provide some unique installation conditions, especially when you are installing pervious concrete on the top of the highest peak of the Santa Cruz Mountains, Mount Umunhum.

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Elk Grove uses Pervious Concrete in a Round-About Way

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Elk Grove uses Pervious Concrete in a Round-About Way

To improve traffic flow at a busy intersection in Elk Grove, the City turned a four way intersection into a round-about. But it's not just any round-about, the new intersection also included features to enhance pedestrian safety and pleasure. Among those features is the new pervious concrete pedestrian and bike path that encircles the round-about. See more by watching the virtual fly-over video.

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Video: Stormwater Sleuthing - Episode 4 - Hyatt Regency, Burlingame

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Video: Stormwater Sleuthing - Episode 4 - Hyatt Regency, Burlingame

During the last winter rain storm of 2016 David went to visit some of our work at the Hyatt Regency in Burlingame, CA. It was really rainy the day he visited, so in this episode you can really see the difference in how stormwater is handled by an impervious pavement versus a pervious pavement.

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Stormwater Sleuthing - Episode 3 - El Camino Park, Palo Alto

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Stormwater Sleuthing - Episode 3 - El Camino Park, Palo Alto

El Niño brought us a gift this winter, some much needed rain! The most recent storm allowed us to finally bring you another in our Stormwater Sleuthing Video series. This episode features a real-life demonstration of the performance of pervious concrete at our recently completed project at El Camino Park in Palo Alto, as compared to traditional asphalt and concrete.

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Don't Let This Godzilla El Niño Smash Up Your City - Protect It with Pervious Concrete

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Don't Let This Godzilla El Niño Smash Up Your City - Protect It with Pervious Concrete

The last time that the category of El Niño was considered Very Stong was the winter of 1997-1998, where many California communities suffered from mudslides and flooding. This year's El Niño is showing signs that it could be even stronger. There is a strong chance that the Bay Area could see as much as twice the annual precipitation, maybe above 40 inches of rain. This could greatly impact the state by damaging homes, disrupting transportation systems, schools, and businesses - potentially costing state residents billions of dollars. Many cities are preparing for the additional rainfall by cleaning out their waterways and storm systems.  California officials are warning people to prepare for potential flooding conditions. You may be asking, "What can I do to reduce the risk of flooding for my home or business?"

One thing you can do is by replacing sidewalks, driveways, parking lots, patios, and roads with pervious concrete. Luckily, installing pervious concrete is one type of El Niño preparation you may be able to receive a rebate for. Saving you money upfront and in the long run!

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Pervious Concrete Has Been Supporting Heavy Loads, Tire Abrasion and Freeze-Thaw Cycles for Years

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Pervious Concrete Has Been Supporting Heavy Loads, Tire Abrasion and Freeze-Thaw Cycles for Years

Over the past few weeks we have seen the internet explode with interest over the recently announced Topmix Permeable concrete from Tarmac Lafarge in the UK. People are marveling over concrete that allows water to not only go through it, and back into the ground, but at an incredible rate. The video we featured on our last blog post is impressive and demonstrated just how fast. We were excited to see so much interest in pervious concrete by so many different people. However, we did notice some discrepancies in the way that pervious concrete was discussed in some of the media outlets, and we wanted to take some time to clarify a couple things.

Some of the media outlets portrayed pervious concrete as a new product that was not available in the United States - which is false. Pervious concrete has been used for stormwater management throughout the US for over 40 years. What's different, or innovative, about Tarmac's Topmix Permeable concrete is it boasts a whopping 35% air void space, which is why it infiltrates at such a high rate.  Tarmac representatives have stated in interviews that the product has some limitations on where, and when, it should be used. They are not recommending Topmix Permeable for high-traffic areas, in places where vehicles make lots of tight turns, or in places with freeze-thaw cycles, as it will eventually start breaking up the surface layer. Some media corespondents have portrayed that all pervious concrete had these limitations - which is also false. While Topmix Permeable may have these limitations, more traditional pervious concrete does not share the same limitations.  In the US, mix designs have evolved and have already solved the issues of heavy traffic, weight loads, turning vehicle traffic, and freeze/thaw cycles. 

Through trial and error the pervious concrete industry has discovered that 20% air void space provides the proper balance between strength, durability, and high infiltration rates. The additional bonds provided by only having 20% air voids, allows for a stronger, longer-lasting material, with just as much infiltration capacity to mitigate all of a site's stormwater. 

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Super Pervious Concrete - A Real Life Demonstration in Palo Alto, CA

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Super Pervious Concrete - A Real Life Demonstration in Palo Alto, CA

The internet has been calling this pervious concrete "Super permeable" and Magical." If you agree, you don't have to travel to the UK to see it or have it! Bay Area Pervious Concrete has been installing super pervious concrete management systems for nearly a decade. This viral video, from  the UK firm Lafarge Tarmac, is a great representative of how fast pervious concrete can infiltrate water, but how does pervious concrete handle longer water events - like heavy rain storms? A real life test of pervious concrete. In our Stormwater Sleuthing video David compares two driveways after at least 12 hours of steady rainfall.

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Arana Gulch Trail - A Revisit

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If you haven't been lucky enough to experience the renovated Arana Gulch Trail in Santa Cruz yet, you are in luck! Thanks to a video shot by Greg McPheeters, of People Power,  you can ride the trail from anywhere.

We are so happy that people are excited about the new trail and are sharing their experiences of it. If you have your own Arana Gulch trail photos to share we would love to see them.

Backyard Greenhouse with Pervious!

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This just in:
A backyard greenhouse with a pervious concrete floor that lets in the sunshine and lets out the water! Check out the video below:

The backyard greenhouse will function as much as a plant habitat as a personal retreat. I understand a chair, and a reading light will go in there, so that the owners can enjoy the plants and sunshine even in the chillier winter months. That sure looks cozy! What do you think?

PIP-CAT Scans of Pervious Concrete

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In keeping with the Pervious In Paradise look back, we have Dr. Narayanan Neithalath Ph.D. P.E.’s presentation of pervious concrete modeling featuring one of my favorite parts- a clip of a pervious cylinder in a CAT scan!

Dr. Neithalath’s presentation was on his research on the effect of mix design on pore structure and infiltration performance. Currently, the state of the art is rife with trial and error which ends up, at worse, with pavement failures, and best, an inconsistent mix. He wants to really understand how different aspects of the pervious concrete mix affect the different performance attributes. In this way, he wants to be able to dial in a pervious mix, with the exact attributes required for the ideal functioning of the installation.

The key feature of pervious concrete is the porosity, which we are all familiar with. Permeability is linearly related to porosity, and while that is obvious, it forms a helpful and fundamental baseline for one aspect of pervious concrete as a hardscape. Other aspects of pervious concrete are less well understood and they include types and seriousness of particle retention or clogging; oil retention, as some are considering pervious concrete as a bio-filter; strength and fracture, for structural considerations; as well as how mix design informs the size, type and structure of the voids. Dr. Neithalath is working to understand how all of these factors come together to form computational performance models for consistent designable pavements. In turn that would create a matrix of variable that could be controlled to create very precise mix designs for producers and installers.

My favorite part of Dr. Neithalath’s presentation was the video he presented of a pervious concrete cylinder in a CATscan, going all the way throughout, such that the void patterns were completely observable. Below you can see the video. I found the whole thing hypnotizing. What do you think?

To see more about Dr. Neithalath’s work, you can go to his faculty page here.

CSU East Bay has a new Concrete Testing Lab

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CSU East Bay has a new Concrete Testing Lab

David had taken some samples at a recent pour and wanted to get them tested. Fortunately, Cristian Gaedicke, Concrete Materials Professor at CSU East Bay, had a new lab with new equipment to break in. We headed over for a tour and a testing field trip. Below are some photos of our compression testing. 

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Stormwater Sleuthing - Episode 2 - Palo Alto

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David Liguori is back in the field, this time comparing a long sloped asphalt driveway with a neighboring long and sloped pervious concrete driveway during a rainstorm last year.

Here Dave compares 2 sloped driveways in a rainstorm - one asphalt, and one pervious concrete. It is the great runoff comparison!

What did you think? Do you have a Stormwater Sleuthing location (in the Bay Area) that you would like David to investigate the next time it rains? Let us know in the comments below or contact us here. Thanks!

Water Conservation Showcase a success!

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Our own Lauren Wray attended the USGBC and P&E’s Water Conservation Showcase this year. The Bay Area Pervious Concrete Booth was in this video, above, and photos of Wray and pervious concrete made it into PG&E’s “Currents”, a P&E news site. Check out the video and let us know your thoughts! Did you attend the Water Conservation Showcase this year?

Stormwater Sleuthing - Episode 1 - Woodside Runoff!

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David Liguori went out into the field, during the last rain, to see what the stormwater runoff situation looked like in Woodside, California. Watch the video below to see what did and didn't run off!  

Come with David Liguori of Bay Area Pervious Concrete as he goes into the field, in the rain, to see first hand the issue of stormwater runoff - or lack there of - on pervious concrete versus other impervious hardscapes!

What did you think? Do you have a Stormwater Sleuthing location (in the Bay Area) that you would like David to investigate the next time it rains? Let us know in the comments below or contact us here. Thanks!

I Spy Video on PERVIOUS CONCRETE!

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25 objects in just under 3 minutes -> How sharp are your eyes?

We have created an ISPY video on the World's Longest Driveway! Can you find all of the items listed below? Feel free to send this link to the keenest eyes you know. Use the full screen option, to catch all the great details! It took me 3 tries to catch everything - how many did it take you?  A list of the items is below the video.

Items to spy below. We recommend you increase the resolution to 720, otherwise, it is hard to see the details. How many did you catch the first time? How many times did it take for you to find them all? We recommend full screen to catch all the details!

Egg carton, Buzz Lightyear toy, V8 bottle, Clipboard, Rubber rat, Hammer, Talking lizards, Santa hat, Manila envelope, Wall-E figurine, Hackeysack, Tennis shoe, Hardshell glasses case, Blonde doll in a pink dress (polly pocket), Rubber chicken, Stack of CDs, Newspaper, Pliers, Roll of tape, Magnifying glass, Padlock and key, The Lost World paperback book, Stuffed animal monkey, Spray bottle & Bar Simpson doll

How many objects did you catch the first time?