From bird sanctuary dream to world’s largest living roof
Dearborn, Michigan: In 1915, before Henry Ford turned a 2,000-acre stretch along the Rogue River into one of America’s largest manufacturing centers, he considered making it a bird sanctuary.
A century later, that vision was realised in an unusual way — on top of the factory itself.
In 2002, Ford installed a 454,000-square-foot “living roof” on the final assembly building at its gargantuan Rouge Factory in Dearborn. At the time, it was the largest turf roof in the world.
The roof — a layer of porous concrete, earth, drought-resistant sedum and wild plants — was designed to solve a flooding problem that had plagued the surrounding stormwater system. Acting as a sponge, it absorbs rainwater into underground chambers and slows runoff.
It worked. The flooding was completely solved. The ecological benefits followed quickly. Local killdeer waited just five days after installation to build nests on the roof, where Ford Raptors and F-150s roll off the assembly line beneath.
Along with keeping the building 10 degrees warmer in winter and 10 degrees cooler in summer, the roof has become a haven for biodiversity.
The 600-acre Rouge Center — still the largest plant in Ford’s inventory and producing for over 100 years — underwent a $2 billion cleanup at the end of the last century to remove nearly a century of industrial contaminants. Today the entire site is dotted with thousands of flowers, shrubs and trees.
Some 20,000 honeybees have moved in, along with birds, insects and butterflies, turning one of America’s most heavily industrialized sites into an unlikely biodiversity hotspot.
