Structural load on existing flyovers
Saturated system weight — frame, modules, media, plants and water — had to be established and accepted against structures never designed for it.
Vertical garden · Completed
24,000 sq ft Vertical Garden on Three Flyovers, Jalandhar
Modular green walls installed and maintained across three flyovers, turning grey infrastructure surfaces into continuous planted facades.
Context
Flyover walls are the hardest surface in urban India to green. They are structural elements that cannot be loaded casually, they sit directly above live traffic, they face full sun on one side and permanent shade on the other, and every maintenance visit requires access equipment and traffic coordination.
Under Jalandhar Smart City, GNIX developed 24,000 sq ft of vertical garden across three flyovers and holds the maintenance for it — the part of a green wall project that determines whether it still exists in year three.
Project facts
| Client | Jalandhar Smart City |
|---|---|
| Area | 24,000 sq ft across three flyovers |
| Scope | Development and maintenance |
| System | Modular vertical garden with zoned drip irrigation |
Constraints
What made this difficult
Extreme light variation on one wall
A single flyover face runs from full Punjab summer sun to deep permanent shade, and a uniform species list would fail on both ends.
Irrigation reliability above live traffic
A pump failure in May kills a wall within days, and the wall cannot be inspected casually — it needs access equipment and traffic management.
Punjab winter and summer extremes
Jalandhar swings from near-freezing winter nights to 45 °C summers, narrowing the viable species list considerably.
Approach
How we handled it
- Engineering before horticultureLoad calculation, fixing design and drainage routing resolved first, so the planting design worked within a system that had already been accepted structurally.
- Light-band species zoningRhoeo and sun-tolerant species in exposed upper bands, syngonium and money plant in shaded and lower zones, with all species chosen for regrowth after a hard cut-back rather than replacement.
- Redundant irrigation with monitoringZoned drip with filtration and manual bypass, so a single point of failure does not take the whole installation.
- Maintenance contracted with the buildDevelopment and maintenance were delivered as one scope, which is the only arrangement under which a flyover wall reliably survives past its first summer.
Outcome
What the project delivered
- 24,000 sq ft of grey flyover surface converted to maintained planted facade
- Species zoned to measured light rather than to a decorative pattern
- A maintenance model that treats irrigation as the primary system, not an accessory
- A repeatable approach subsequently applied to metro station walls in Noida
Palette
Species used on this project
vertical garden plants
Rhoeo
Tradescantia spathacea
The purple-backed rosette that survives full sun on a green wall and doubles as a hard-wearing groundcover — the toughest plant in the vertical garden palette.
- Height250–400 mm
- WaterLow to moderate
- MaintenanceLow
vertical garden plants
Syngonium
Syngonium podophyllum
The backbone species of Indian green walls: fast, forgiving, available in green, cream and pink forms, and able to regrow from a hard cut-back in place.
- Height300–600 mm in a wall module; trails to 1 m+
- WaterConsistent moisture
- MaintenanceModerate
vertical garden plants
Money Plant
Epipremnum aureum
The most forgiving plant in Indian interior and vertical landscaping — trailing, variegated, nearly impossible to kill, and the standard filler for green walls and planter edges.
- HeightTrails 1–3 m from a module
- WaterModerate
- MaintenanceLow
vertical garden plants
Spider Plant
Chlorophytum comosum
A striped arching rosette that fills modules fast, propagates itself on runners and tolerates the light swings that kill fussier green-wall species.
- Height250–400 mm
- WaterModerate
- MaintenanceLow
Capability
Services applied
Specialist system
Vertical Gardens and Green Walls
Modular green walls on live infrastructure and building facades — engineered for structural load, irrigation redundancy and the maintenance access that keeps them alive after year one.
Service detailAnnual contract
Landscape and Greenery Maintenance (AMC)
Annual maintenance contracts that keep planted assets looking deliberate — with a written calendar, defined KPIs and reporting instead of an unscheduled crew.
Service detailMore
Other case studies
CompletedExpressway
Delhi–Meerut Expressway
Avenue and median plantation with maintenance on one of the most heavily used access-controlled corridors in the National Capital Region.
- ClientNational Highways Authority of India
- LocationDelhi NCR to Meerut
- ScopeCorridor plantation and maintenance
CompletedExpressway
Eastern Peripheral Expressway
Structured plantation and sustained maintenance on a major NCR bypass corridor built to divert heavy vehicle traffic around Delhi.
- ClientNational Highways Authority of India
- LocationNCR ring corridor
- ScopeCorridor plantation and maintenance
CompletedVertical garden
Noida metro vertical gardens
Green walls on four operational DMRC metro stations, bringing planted surfaces into daily commuter infrastructure.
- ClientNoida Industrial Development Authority
- LocationNoida
- ScopeDevelopment and maintenance of 10,000 sq ft vertical garden
Planning a plantation, landscape or green wall package?
Send the site details, the drawings if you have them, and the maintenance budget you expect. You will get an honest read on species, timing and what the site can actually sustain.