By Steven Peck, GRP, Honorary ASLA
Founder and President, Green Roofs for Healthy Cities

In October, Green Roofs for Healthy Cities will finally be taking a bite out of the ‘Big Apple’ with its 13th Annual CitiesAlive Conference, Awards and Trade Show coming to New York City from the 5th to the 8th.

New York has in terms of scale, the biggest market with the most designers and the greatest number of cool projects to see anywhere in the WORLD.  We have a really great program located at the newly renovated Brooklyn Marriott Hotel, just a short walk from the historic Brooklyn Bridge and Pier.  The trade show runs Monday evening and Tuesday afternoon, and will incorporate book launches, including an exciting new work by award winning photographer Brad Temkin, as well as research posters and technical product sessions.

In addition to our many expert speakers with the latest in policy, design and research, we are featuring more tours than ever to help get you out into the city.  We’ve shortened the program so that on Wednesday afternoon, immediately following the Awards of Excellence Luncheon, (note that award nominations are due June 30), and on Thursday you can kick the tires on one of the many awesome New York green roof and wall projects.  We’ve also tried to pair up speakers and tours as much as possible so you can hear about projects in the sessions and then go and visit them afterwards.  Several options include the NYC Parks Department’s Research Center at Freshkills, the huge Javitz Center, the High Line linear park, and many, many more…

The Local Host Committee is also organizing a phenomenal private dinner cruise on the Zephr Yacht with dinner and an open bar for Tuesday October 6th (a ticket event).  On Wednesday night we will be having a limited seating VIP Dinner at Brooklyn Granges’ Navy Yard Farm complex, which is pretty amazing because not only is it urban farm pioneer Ben Flanner’s working farm and it has fantastic views of Manhattan.

If you can, come early and take in some of the many sights, then roll into the conference on Monday for some training or to take the GRP exam and enjoy the proceedings until Thursday.  We wrap up the conference with an informal amble along the High Line on Thursday evening…  If all goes well, we’ll also be having a Green Infrastructure Charrette on Thursday during which we’ll be redesigning for up to ten blocks of this historic neighborhood.

The early bird rate for CitiesAlive ends soon – June 30th – and most of the ticketed, a la carte events have limited seating so please don’t wait and be disappointed.

Register now for CitiesAlive at: www.citiesalive.org and the Brooklyn Marriot Conference Hotel.

I hope to see you all in the Big Apple this October and hope you have a fantastic summer designing, building and maintaining living architecture!

Sincerely yours,

Steven Peck, GRP, Honorary ASLA
Founder and President
Green Roofs for Healthy Cities
Chair, Green Infrastructure Ontario Coalition
Tel: 416-971-4494 ext. 233
www.greenroofs.org