SERVICES PROVIDED

• Assessed existing trail and possible solutions
• Coordinated budget, schedule, and construction
• Hydrologic and hydraulic analysis
• Design-build

PROJECT ELEMENTS

• Sensitive, highly visited site
  
• Universal access aggregate trail
• Design-build project
  

PROJECT DETAILS

The meadow garden at Longwood Gardens was designed and built by others with an aggregate trail system and pavilion sited at the bottom of a large bowl-shaped meadow slope. Penn Trails was hired to rehabilitate the trail system when stormwater overwhelmed the design, causing the aggregate to sheer away and inundating the pavilion area and downslope trails with water and mud. Early stages of the project were a design-build that involved realignment of the trail and reconstruction to raise the trail above the soggy ground. Currently in progress, later stages of the project involve detailed hydrologic and hydraulic analysis, design of a stormwater conveyance system to protect the new trails, and construction of a flagstone patio with rain garden features around the pavilion area. When complete, the meadow garden will contain a network of universal access aggregate trails that will allow a four-season experience even in the wettest parts of the meadow garden, with a pavilion program area that will be environmentally sustainable despite heavy rainfall.