General Motors engaged PEA Group to design a 1.4-mile exercise pathway for their corporate campus – a workplace for 16,000 engineers, designers, and technicians. The site location for the pathway presented a unique challenge: it awkwardly featured an abandoned, reinforced concrete, vehicular test track, posing a blighted appearance to the campus. Because removing the test track would be cost-prohibitive and wasteful, we developed a plan to convert the track into a pervious surface by mechanically cracking the pavement.
Over 60,000 cubic yards of soil were moved from elsewhere on the campus to cover the cracked concrete and provide a seedbed for deep-rooted, native meadow plants that will continue to separate the cracked concrete. A meandering 8-foot-wide asphalt pathway with seating areas and groves of trees completes the design.
This sustainable solution eliminated the negative impacts of the test track without the cost and environmental waste of removing the pavement. The site is now an attractive meadow with a popular walking path enjoyed by many on the campus.