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Grasscrete car park at Farmleigh, Dublin
Farmleigh, the former home to the Guinness Brewing family, now operates as a major residency venue in Dublin, for conferences and visiting dignitaries. During renovation works, the venue required a parking area for up to 350 cars, including heavy loads such as coaches. It was also necessary to maintain a green vista, with no road kerbs or street
Farmleigh, the former home to the Guinness Brewing family, now operates as a major residency venue in Dublin, for conferences and visiting dignitaries.
During renovation works, the venue required a parking area for up to 350 cars, including heavy loads such as coaches.
It was also necessary to maintain a green vista, with no road kerbs or street furniture. The grass paving would need to accept surface water run-off from its own footprint as well as that of adjacent access roads avoiding the need for wide scale drainage works.
Solution
Grasscrete was selected - a reinforced concrete cast-on-site, 100mm thick GC1 type, with A252 (8mm diameter) mesh.
To create the necessary car park zones, Grasscrete was specified for the parking areas, with access roads constructed using a network of asphalt-surfaced aisles. Each aisle was formed with cross falls directed towards the Grasscrete, to enable collection of surface water run-off.
Grasscrete's integral solid edges eliminated the need for kerbs - the asphalt was finishing directly to the edge of the Grasscrete.
Outcome
With the individual soil pockets fully protected by concrete surrounds, the surface could be used prior to grass growth, enabling a phased handover of this successful application.
