480 Queen Street is a thirty four level commercial tower at the river end of Queen Street, finished in 2015. The greenery is not decoration bolted on afterwards. There is a public park on level four, a tree grove on the roof at level thirty one, and planting set into the facade in between. Abseil Pro has maintained the vertical gardens and the facade planters on rope since 2018.

A commercial tower changes what the work has to fit around. There is no quiet weekend. The footpath below is one of the busiest in the CBD, tenants are at their desks behind the glass the whole time, and the building runs to a building manager rather than a committee, so access is booked and permits are signed before anyone racks up.

At a glance

Location

Brisbane CBD

Services

Vertical garden and facade planter maintenance

Access

Rope access, rigged from above

Frequency

Quarterly, since 2018

Photos

On site

Landscaped terrace on level four at 480 Queen Street, Brisbane — The level four park, looking out over the river.

Rope access technician rigged on the level four terrace at 480 Queen Street — Rigged on the terrace, river and bridge behind.

Terrace planting and glass balustrade at 480 Queen Street with the Story Bridge behind — Planting on the terrace with the Story Bridge beyond.

Rope access technician pruning the green wall at 480 Queen Street — On the rope, working into the green wall.

Planting in a rooftop planter at 480 Queen Street seen from above — Looking straight down into a planter on the way past.

Rope access technician working a facade planter at 480 Queen Street — Working a planter run high on the building.

Technician working in a facade planter above the street at 480 Queen Street — In the bed, cutting back, traffic underneath.

Rope access technician descending past facade planting at 480 Queen Street, Brisbane — On rope over Queen Street with the planting alongside.

Technician bagging green waste at a facade planter at 480 Queen Street — Green waste bagged at the planter rather than dropped.

Looking down past facade planting to the street at 480 Queen Street — Straight down past the planted edge to the road.

Rope access technician working a cascade of planting on the stone facade at 480 Queen Street — Rigged beside the planting where it spills down the stone.

Rope access technician pruning the vertical garden on the facade at 480 Queen Street — In the middle of it, cutting back from the rope.

Planted bed at the base of the glass tower at 480 Queen Street with a technician on rope — The bed at the base, with thirty four levels of glass above.

Technician on rope beside the stepped stone facade at 480 Queen Street — Past the stepped stonework, Queen Street below.

Rope access technician descending with a green waste bag at 480 Queen Street — Coming down with the bag, city behind.

Facade planting at 480 Queen Street seen from above during a drop — The planting from above, mid drop.

The gardens

A garden that only exists because someone can reach it

Planting runs up the facade and across the terraces on levels nobody can walk to. A green wall is not forgiving either. Leave it a season and the growth closes over itself, the inside dies back, and what you get is a brown patch on the front of a building people signed a lease to look at.

On every round

Prune the green wall and the facade planters back to shape, and cut out anything growing across the glass

Clear dead growth out of the middle of the wall so light and water get back in

Take roots out of drains, basins and soffits before they get into the waterproofing

Bag green waste at the planter and lower it, rather than dropping anything to the footpath

Flag what a prune will not fix, whether that is irrigation, drainage or dead stock

How a round runs

Rounds land quarterly. The terraces, the green wall and the facade planters are worked in the same visit, so the building deals with one access booking rather than three.

Photos go up the same day, so the building has a dated record of what was cut and what was found, level by level.

How we get to it

Rigged from above, over a live street

Most of it is rigged from above and worked on rope. Some of the terrace planting is reached on foot, clipped in at the edge. Either way the setup is booked with the building first, and access doors are locked behind the crew every time.

Getting to the planting

A technician stops partway down, gets in to the planter or the wall, works it with both hands and then keeps going. That is slower than a straight drop, and it is why this work is priced by the hour rather than by the drop.

Gear is carried up and stored where the building nominates, and nothing is left on a terrace between visits.

How we leave it

Tools tethered, and green waste bagged at the planter rather than dropped

Exclusion zones and a spotter on the footpath under any live drop

Bags kept out of sight during the round and taken off site at the end of it

Keys, passes and permits back to the building before anyone leaves

Terraces swept and left clear, because they are somewhere people sit

Photos uploaded the same day, so the record exists whether or not anyone asks for it

Challenges

What makes this one awkward

The planting is on the front of a building that trades on how it looks. It has to read as deliberate from the street and from the offices above it, and it cannot be cut back hard just to stretch the interval between visits.

Everything below is footpath, awning and glass. Queen Street does not close, so nothing comes off the building. Every cut is bagged where it is made and lowered on a line.

The terraces are amenity, not plant rooms. People eat lunch on level four, so the crew works around them and puts it back the way it was found.

Outcome

What the building gets

Greenery that stays inside a prune instead of building up to a recovery, on levels that have no other way in. Four visits a year, one access booking each time, and a crew who already know where every anchor and every planter sits.

Abseil Pro has been on this building since 2018. The green walls came out and were rebuilt to a different design in between, and the same crew went back up on the new ones. A tower with a park on level four and a tree grove on the roof is leased partly on how that greenery looks, and that only works if somebody can reach it.