Green Roofs - Living Architecture Monitor - Summer 2020 - 23

POLICY

OBSERVATIONS FROM THE
GREEN ROOF POLICY FRONT
JEFF JOSLIN, DIRECTOR OF CURRENT PLANNING, CITY AND COUNTY OF SAN FRANCISCO

Green roofs have been with us for centuries. But it's this past decade that's brought North
America the most significant advancement in, and proliferation of, green roof policies.

umerous cities and towns have successfully made the case
for the environmental and economic efficacy of green roofs
across a range of political and climatological settings. While
each has done their own homework and advocacy, so too have
evolved various principles and practices useful to those looking to
further existing policies, or implement new ones.
To capture these advancements, and to provide a baseline tool
for municipalities considering developing policies specific to their
unique environment, Green Roofs for Healthy Cities recently
published a new guide: Green Roof Policy in North America.
This document not only serves as a compendium of established
regulatory and incentive approaches and policies, but also provides
an overview of lessons-learned and strategic considerations when
attempting to develop and advance such policies and regulations.
Following are some observations that have resulted from this
rapidly evolving collective knowledge set.

POLICY IS FINE, BUT ONE MUST ESTABLISH A
CLEAR PATH TO ACTUAL IMPLEMENTATION.

Policy advocacy and placement can contribute to awareness of
green roofs as a climate-change strategy, and promote education
about green roofs. For entities just entering the climate change
arena, identifying green roofs as an essential and practical response
may be a useful and necessary initial step. However, policies without implementation goals and tools push the critical work farther
into the future. The time to implement meaningful tools is now,
and any policy should establish defined and aggressive goals and
timelines.
Likelihood of success is dramatically improved if defensible
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financial analyses is at the forefront of the effort.
Any effort to establish a policy or regulation should include
anticipatory financial analysis to address concerns about the firstcost of green roof installation and maintenance. Economic concern
is inevitable: it's the one aspect that all policy makers and the
constituencies most affected will raise early. Demonstrated benefits
at various building scales, and at the community-wide scale have
proven to win over a wide variety of constituencies for the policies
in cities like New York, San Francisco and Toronto.
The analytical tools exist and are accessible. Executing a costbenefit analysis that is transparent and defensible is essential to best
understand and describe the implications and benefits of prospective policy initiatives.
Assumptions within such analyses need to be based in local
bioclimatic conditions, zoning and the specific development environment. The more ready and complete the analysis, the greater
the likelihood of advancement. Once an analysis is established for
a particular geography, it's a modest effort to apply it to various
building typologies as appropriate for the locality. This information
will address concerns of stakeholders, and can also contribute to the
crafting of a more effective policy.

FINANCIAL ANALYSIS AND GREEN
INFRASTRUCTURE ARE NOT JUST
FOR THE RITZY PROJECTS.

Cities around the world are currently facing an affordable housing
challenge. In the absence of analysis and advocacy, policy makers
and others will raise the issue of "unnecessary" first costs, claiming
such cost would put affordability further out of reach. In fact,
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Green Roofs - Living Architecture Monitor - Summer 2020

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