Article Highlights
Better soundscapes: Mitigating environmental sources of irritation, like traffic noise, is a key factor to design inviting urban places.
Green density: The vertical integration of a variety of plants significantly amplifies the area’s green density, creating an immersive natural experience.
Enhanced wellbeing: Greenery provides a sanctuary of coolness, tranquillity and shade and elevates comfort of seating areas.
Transforming urban spaces into green and vibrant places requires finding innovative combinations. Although it helps bring coolness, biodiversity and calmness in public spaces, incorporating nature in city centres is a tricky challenge. With this in mind, Parkly and InnoGreen developed a new kind of modular green wall.
The challenge:
Nature of soundscape is a crucial aspect of the quality of urban spaces. Too much traffic noise can be considered environmental pollution as it is a source of disturbance. In the earth of downton Helsinki, Erottaja Square is exposed to the noise of passing cars and trams. In addition, lack of seating and greenery on the square led the City of Helsinki to commission Parkly to address the question of traffic noise reduction.
The solution:
Greenery provides an innovative solution to multiple urban challenges. Strategically designed, Parkly collaborate with InnoGreen to incorporate a dense vegetation wall sitting on a row of seatings. The solution provides a great synergy of social and environmental infrastructures, as the presence of massive vegetation cools and quiets the seating space. This creative nature-based solution creates an oasis with a pleasant soundscape and comfortable seating. The modular green wall is a valuable asset for biodiversity as most of the various plants are pollinator-friendly.
Outcome measurement:
-7 dB: The modular green wall has been tested with the city of Helsinki to examine how it can serve as a barrier against traffic noise. The results are encouraging: the wall alleviates traffic noise by an average of about 7 decibels at sitting height – a significant improvement for a better soundscape.
Pollinators: The pollinators enjoyed the abundance of plants, and several different species were observed in the monitoring, for example wool carder bees (erakkomehiläiset).
All results can be found in the final report of the experiment.
The modular green wall is the result of the collaboration with InnoGreen – Parkly’s partner in Finland: ”As a greening company, we want to approach urban greening from a new perspective and now we have a partner in Parkly who shares the same values – finding ways to make built environments greener and more welcoming. And at the heart of what we both do is sustainability, adaptability and the desire to create a human urban greenness.” Development Director, Oula Harjula, InnoGreen
The modular green wall is part of our product range and installed in several more locations in Helsinki and beyond.
Urban Revival:
- Enhancing attractiveness: The vegetation and shade provided by the wall of vegetation offer a cooler place to sit down on a hot day. It improves the experience of residents, customers and tourists spending time in downtown Helsinki.
- Project flexibility: The modular green wall is available in various sizes and is perfect for street implementations, roof terraces, work and study environments, and various other public spaces.
- Environmental and aesthetic contributions: The introduction of a lush green wall of plants transforms the urban square into a vibrant focal point, showcasing a tangible ecological commitment while enhancing the visual appeal.
Interested in collaborating with Parkly to incorporate more seating and greenery in your area? Get in touch for more information and explore other successful case studies, such as how we participated in a Riverside Renewal in Turku.
Parkly is dedicated to making urban spaces greener, more functional, and vibrant for everyone to enjoy.
