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Ford has begun to implement several projects that start to take advantage
of the specific opportunities for better interrelationships between office
parks and local contexts.
Office parks often have much open space between buildings that can be
coordinated in their design to create larger natural 'fragments' that increase
in value to natural systems and wildlife habitats in areas that are
typically very urbanized. Office parks are also usually developed over a
period of several years, so that they often have expanses of vacant land
around and between developed properties.
Sunflower Fields
Instead of treating these areas with the typical groundcover of grass, a
few of the remaining vacant sites at Fairlane and the open land that
surrounds the Ford World Headquarters have been experimentally planted with
sunflowers for the past 3 years in an effort to provide a stopover zone for
migrating birds in the winter. The area of the project has expanded
continually over the three years, with 18 acres planted at first, 40 the
second year, and now around 95 acres of sunflower fields. The flowers are
left unharvested through the winter so migrating birds may feed on the
seeds. The nearby Environmental
Interpretive Center at the University
of Michigan-Dearborn
campus has documented the increase of bird species and the related health
effects over the course of the project. In addition to birds, other animals
such as foxes, deer, and coyote have been spotted among the fields. The
planted areas are near the convergence of three branches of the Rouge River
in Dearborn,
an important wildlife habitat. The fields provide an extension to the
feeding and habitat area offered by the River.
In addition to their natural benefits, the sunflower fields reduce the
maintenance and costs that would be required to maintain a grass landscape
in these areas. The sunflower crops are planted twice yearly, once in the
spring, then they are plowed in July and replanted in the late summer and
left unharvested through the winter. The twice yearly planting and plowing
constitutes much less labor and time than weekly mowings throughout the
spring and summer months.
Improving the Freeway
The freeway can be considered part of the office park typology, as office
parks typically develop along exit routes to maintain access to city
centers and employee homes in other suburbs. The Southfield freeway bisects
the Fairlane development through its
entire area. Recently, the grass groundcover along the freeway suffered
from lack of maintenance. Because the freeway is considered by Ford to be
an important threshold to the Fairlane development, they applied to the
Michigan Department of Transportation for a grant to improve its condition.
Ford was granted a budget, and proceeded to plant wildflower grasses and
over 1000 trees along 6 miles of the freeway. Ford's interventions improve
the appearance of the freeway, improve the erosion prevention capacity of
the groundcover, and decrease maintenance requirements and therefore cost
of maintenance.
The Wildlife Habitat Council
The Fairlane development has been a Wildlife Habitat Council certified site
since 1999. The Wildlife Habitat Council is a non-profit organization of
corporations, conservation organizations, and individuals that helps
corporations achieve environmentally responsible practices with their
private properties. The Council works in collaboration with corporate
employees and management, local community groups and members, and larger
conservation groups in the specific regions involved, along with local,
state, and federal agencies. (information from Wildlife Habitat Council
website)
Activities with the Wildlife
Habitat Council:
Fairlane has participated in the WHC's Nest Monitoring Program, where corporate
employees build and maintain bluebird boxes and bat and butterfly houses
throughout the properties. They also are working to control invasive plant
species in the region and protect an aquatic habitat in a creek near the
Headquarters building.
Corporate Lands for Learning (CLL)
The Ford Motor Company in Dearborn has been a pilot corporation for the
development of the Corporate Lands for Learning program through the
Wildlife Habitat Council. Corporate Lands for Learning is a program
intended to bring together corporations and local schools and community
groups to use the corporate land as a hands-on learning resource for the
study of local plants and natural systems for both adults and youths. Since
Fairlane occupies the largest amount of open land in Dearborn and surrounds
or is adjacent to the Rouge River that runs through the city, it can
provide the local community with a diverse landscape for on-site learning.
Daniel Ballnik, Ford Fairlane's
Environmental Control Engineer, has led community demonstration projects
with wetlands that exist on the Fairlane properties for Dearborn residents
and local schools. Students learn about riparian corridors along the local
Rouge River and do plantings of their own. Ballnik has also developed other
service efforts with the Ford employees, such as leading a Ford Rouge River
Cleanup that was attended by over 600 employees, and storm water management
projects.
Network Impacts
Ford's involvement with the Wildlife Habitat Council and Corporate Lands
for Learning has lead to other projects within the Ford Motor Company in
sites across the United States (for instance, Ford properties in the Twin
Cities and in Norfolk have recently joined the Corporate Lands for Learning
project) and to other agencies and corporations. For example, the Wildlife
Habitat Council in Michigan often brings tour groups composed of other
corporate leaders and government agencies such as the Michigan Department
of Environmental Quality to the Fairlane development to demonstrate the
initiatives that Ford has taken in Dearborn, with a goal that Ford's
innovations and experiments might be emulated in other contexts.
The Urban and Natural Context
Fairlane in Dearborn
Reasons Behind the Fairlane Projects
Evaluations
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Some of the areas around the Headquarters that will grow
into sunflower fields
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