Greening, Going, Gone

This isn't new info, but I thought that as the officially kicked off construction of the Edith Green Wendell Wyatt Federal Building - sporting a massive living wall (seen here).  As has been reported, the vegetated wall will be replaced with an array of aluminum 'reeds' for a low(er) maintenance way of hiding an ass-ugly building.

:: image via Skyscraper Page

A bit of info, via Free Republic:

"A plan to install what would have been North America’s largest living wall on the west facade of the Edith Green-Wendell Wyatt Federal Building in Portland has been deemed too risky, and too expensive, by the General Services Administration.

Portland’s SERA Architects and Cutler Anderson Architects of Bainbridge Island, Wash., received international attention for proposing 250-foot-tall vegetated “fins” to shade the federal building’s west side. The building’s energy performance is tied to the amount of shade it receives throughout the day, according to Don Eggleston, president of SERA Architects.because of concerns about high costs of installation and potential maintenance of the vegetated facade, the building’s west side instead will be covered with a series of long, aluminum poles Eggleston calls “reeds.”

“It’s disappointing, but you have to look at the maintenance, operations and risk involved with a new building technology,” Eggleston said. “Once we started looking at the cost benefit of the living wall, we started looking for alternatives. The most cost effective and easiest-to-maintain option is aluminum.”

Reeds, huh?  I see.  Sigh.