Archive for the ‘RIVER RESTORATION’ Category

A NEW URBANISM, PLUCKED FROM THE GARDEN

Posted in BROWNFIELDS, CITIES, ECOLOGY, ENVIRONMENT, GARDENS, HABITAT, HISTORIC LANDSCAPES, ONLINE ONLY, PARKS, PLANNING, PLANTS, RECREATION, RESIDENTIAL, RESILIENCE, REUSE, RIVER RESTORATION, SHORELINE, WATER, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on November 7, 2019| Leave a Comment »

BY NATE BERG

A view of the park’s two lakes, with the city in the distance. Photo courtesy Bundesgartenschau Heilbronn.

An urban-scale garden exhibition in Germany became an opportunity to re-envision a riverside industrial site.

 

For more than half a century, the historic center of the southwestern German city of Heilbronn looked out across the waters of the Neckar River onto 80 gray acres of railyards and warehouses. As its industrial activity shifted and concentrated, the need for such large swaths of land diminished and much of this logistics landscape lay fallow.

“For urban planners, this was like a gold mine,” says Oliver Toellner. He’s a landscape architect and urban planner, and for the past 10 years he’s been transforming this large industrial plot into a new park and urban district for 3,500 residents and 1,000 jobs. (more…)

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NOVEMBER LAM: DROUGHT & DELUGE

Posted in CITIES, CLIMATE, ECOLOGY, EDUCATION, ENVIRONMENT, ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE, FEATURES, HABITAT, HEALTHY COMMUNITIES, HISTORIC LANDSCAPES, HISTORY, ONLINE ONLY, PARKS, PEOPLE, PLANNING, PLANTS, PRESERVATION, RECREATION, REGION, RESILIENCE, RIVER RESTORATION, SPECIES, STREETS, THE CLIENT, WATER, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on November 1, 2019| Leave a Comment »

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FOREGROUND

Get with the Program (Tech)
As workflow patterns change, designers are diversifying in the types of software they rely on,
a recent survey of landscape architects shows.

Lunch Break Brutalism (Preservation)
The water is flowing again at M. Paul Friedberg’s much-disputed Peavey Plaza in Minneapolis,
after a renovation by Coen+Partners adjusts the space to latter-day concerns.

FEATURES

Look to the Sky
In Santa Fe, Surroundings Studio relies on scarce rainfall for all the water one
house’s garden could need.

Floods That Know No Bounds
Nogales, Mexico, and Nogales, Arizona, have a border wall between them, but an unruly, overstressed watershed needs a binational solution to stop flooding. Gabriel Díaz Montemayor, ASLA, and a colleague, Francisco Lara-Valencia, have some ideas.

Get Real
Vicki Estrada, FASLA, talks about the change in her practice at Estrada Land Planning in San Diego
since her transition 13 years ago. For one thing, it has meant no more going along to get along.
Interview by Diana Fernandez, ASLA

In Kīlauea’s Wake
After a series of violent eruptions of Kīlauea in 2018, the staff of Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park is figuring out ways to proceed with a natural and cultural treasure that is constantly changing.

As always, you can buy this issue of Landscape Architecture Magazine at more than 250 bookstores, including many university stores and independents, as well as at Barnes & Noble. You can also buy single digital issues for only $5.25 at Zinio or order single copies of the print issue from ASLA. Annual subscriptions for LAM are a thrifty $59 for print and $44.25 for digital. Our subscription page has more information on subscription options.

Keep an eye out here on the blog, on the LAM Facebook page, and on our Twitter feed (@landarchmag), as we’ll be posting November articles as the month rolls out.

Credits: “Floods That Know No Bounds,” Gabriel Díaz Montemayor, ASLA; “Look to the Sky,” Stephen Dunn; “Get Real,” Brian Kuhlmann; “In Kīlauea’s Wake,” USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory; “Get with the Program,” Drew Hill, Student ASLA/Utah State University; “Lunch Break Brutalism,” Peter Bastianelli-Kerze.

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ONE FISH, MORE FISH

Posted in ECOLOGY, ENVIRONMENT, HABITAT, PEOPLE, PLANNING, PRESERVATION, RECREATION, REGION, RESEARCH, RESILIENCE, RIVER RESTORATION, SHORELINE, SPECIES, WATER, WILDLIFE, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on August 29, 2019| 3 Comments »

 BY JARED BREY

Why a Maryland landscape architect restores brook trout habitat in his free time.

FROM THE AUGUST 2019 ISSUE OF LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE MAGAZINE.

 

The underbelly of an eastern brook trout, especially when it is spawning, is orange and pink like a sunrise, and its back is dappled brown and green like a forest floor. The spots along its lateral line are small and circular like pink and yellow confetti, and the vermiculations on its back are yellowish and serpentine, like a Polynesian tattoo. It is a small fish, typically no longer than about 10 and a half inches—the height of this page—fully grown. It breeds in streams as far west as Minnesota and as far south as the extent of the Appalachian Mountains, in Georgia. First described in 1814, the species is thought to have come into its own during the Pliocene Epoch, between two million and five million years ago. Unlike the brown trout, which is commonly stocked for sportfishing, the brook trout is a member of the char genus. Both are members of the Salmonidae family, which also includes salmon.

The brook trout insists on cold water, and prefers to spend time in waterways with an even distribution of riffles and pools. When it is feeding, on plankton at first and later on insects as it matures, the fish wants to spend as little energy as possible to acquire food. It will hide in shadow in deep pools, and wait for bugs to come surfing down the thin seam of fast water that flows downstream from shallow rapids. If it senses an opportunity, it will strike. Sometimes it will catch a mayfly nymph, and sometimes it will catch an artificial fly tied to a fishing line owned by Scott Scarfone, ASLA. (more…)

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DESIGN SCHOOL ABODES FOR THE BIRDS

Posted in BROWNFIELDS, CITIES, ECOLOGY, ENVIRONMENT, HABITAT, HISTORIC LANDSCAPES, ONLINE ONLY, PLANTS, RECREATION, RIVER RESTORATION, SHORELINE, SPECIES, STUDENTS, THE CLIENT, WATER, WILDLIFE, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 27, 2019| Leave a Comment »

BY ZACH MORTICE

University of Illinois at Chicago students’ birdhouse designs for the Chicago River. Photo courtesy Lendlease.

While working with a group of University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) industrial design students on their birdhouse design studio, Ted Wolff had a few pointers on how they should approach interior dimensions and ventilation. There should be enough room at its base for eggs, but not much extra. A slit that allows crosscurrent air circulation is good, but much bigger and cold winds might howl through the birdhouse in the winter.

“You want them to feel snug, if you will,” says Wolff, of Wolff Landscape Architecture. “That’s probably anthropomorphizing them a bit much.” (more…)

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LAMCAST: SWEPT AWAY

Posted in HISTORIC LANDSCAPES, ONLINE ONLY, PLANNING, PRESERVATION, RECREATION, REGION, REGULATIONS, RESILIENCE, RIVER RESTORATION, STREETS, WATER, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 7, 2019| Leave a Comment »

Most of the time, Ellicott City, Maryland is a historic mill town with picturesque stone shops nestled next to granite hills and a boisterous, yet still peaceful, river. But more and more, it’s becoming a crucible for the cost of climate change-induced downpours and development that’s ill-placed, if intensely historic. (The town was founded in 1772.) Twice since 2016, Ellicott City has seen branches of the Patapsco River jump their banks after torrential rains, devastating its downtown with two “1,000-year floods,” a description rapidly losing its meaning in an era of increased extreme weather.

This PBS NewsHour segment from the most recent flood looked in on how one Ellicott City business fared: an antique shop where the owner doggedly pushed furniture away from the front door, where a torrent of water outside whisked cars down the street. That is, until a sudden eruption of water knocked down walls, sending display cases toppling like dominoes.

The town’s newest flood-proofing plan, developed with help from Baltimore’s Mahan Rykiel, calls for 10 buildings to be demolished downtown to widen the river canal at a cost of $50 million, as well as a new terraced river park. As explored in Jared Brey’s “Twice Bitten” (to be posted here later this month), it’s a plan that preserves Ellicott City’s future by destroying a bit of its past.

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APRIL LAM: BETTER WAYS

Posted in ECOLOGY, ECONOMICS, ENVIRONMENT, HEALTHY COMMUNITIES, ONLINE ONLY, PARKS, PLANNING, PRACTICE, RECREATION, RESILIENCE, RIVER RESTORATION, STREETS, THE CLIENT, WATER, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on April 1, 2019| Leave a Comment »

Sunset Triangle Plaza in Los Angeles, by Rios Clementi Hale Studios. Photo by Jim Simmons.

Welcome to spring! For World Landscape Architecture Month, the April issue of LAM is FREE! We’ve taken this month to go back a decade and mark the start of a movement, the Pop-Up Decade, which, who knows, could become the pop-up century. Remember 2009? Everyone was blue. There was no work—or money. But designers and their clients picked up something potent begun by the firm Rebar (now Gehl) in San Francisco with the creation of Park(ing) Day: quick, cheap, usually temporary projects to wet the public’s feet with ideas about civic spaces, try them out, see how they respond. Many of those projects went away; many more turned into something lasting. It was an idea that suited the bad old days of the early teens, but it also has continued to translate well to more prosperous times, as our feature stories show you here.

In the Back is a piece every person in the profession should read, a conversation among four successful women designers on why they left powerful jobs in high-profile firms to chart their own ways ahead. It covers what is often a lot of unspoken ground—unspoken because many women don’t dare air their concerns at work, and because men in the workplace can be rather obtuse at times.

Please share the issue far and wide with colleagues, clients, and friends.

FOREGROUND

A Floodplain Forest (Water)
This setback levee project will give a river room to meander and help protect Hamilton City, California, from flooding.

Open Book (Planning)
A new stormwater management manual for multifamily residences aids resilience in
Lexington, Kentucky.

FEATURES

Get It Done
The Great Recession helped launch a wave of quick, low-cost projects to suit budgets
of the era. It’s still going strong.

Make It Pop
Some popped up and popped back down. Some stuck around or led to bigger things.
An album from a decade of pop-up.

Power Play
The nonprofit KaBOOM! has perfected a seemingly guerrilla approach to making playgrounds where kids lack them.

THE BACK

The Big Time. The Bigger Time.
A conversation among the women behind the Women’s Landscape Equality (re)Solution.

An Antidote to Excess (Books)
A review of Doing Almost Nothing: The Landscapes of Georges Descombes, by Marc Treib.

A Planetary Proposal (Backstory)
A sprawling corridor park could connect Earth’s most biodiverse places.

All this plus the regular Now and Goods columns. The full table of contents for April can be found here.

The digital edition of the April LAM is FREE, and you can access it here and share it with your clients, colleagues, and friends. You can also buy this issue of Landscape Architecture Magazine at more than 250 bookstores, including many university stores and independents, as well as at Barnes & Noble. Single digital issues are available for only $5.25 at Zinio or you can order single copies of the print issue from ASLA. Annual subscriptions for LAM are a thrifty $59 for print and $44.25 for digital. Our subscription page has more information on subscription options.

Keep an eye out here on the blog, on the LAM Facebook page, and on our Twitter feed (@landarchmag), for more updates on #WLAM and the April issue.

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UPSTREAM D.C.

Posted in CITIES, ECOLOGY, GARDENS, IN THE ISSUE, MATERIALS, PLANNING, REGION, REGULATIONS, RESILIENCE, RIVER RESTORATION, STREETS, TRANSPORTATION, WATER, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on November 29, 2018| Leave a Comment »

BY BRADFORD MCKEE

Gray infrastructure has given way to green to prevent sewer overflows into Washington, D.C.’s waters.

FROM “THE RIVER BENEATH THE RIVER,” IN THE NOVEMBER 2018 ISSUE OF LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE MAGAZINE.

 

Green infrastructure is now an important part of the Clean Rivers Project. The colossal Anacostia River tunnel remains a fixture in the effort on the east side of the city to hold and carry stormwater to DC Water’s Blue Plains Advanced Wastewater Treatment Plant. But to the west, the introduction of green infrastructure is allowing the elimination of one smaller tunnel for a combined sewer network above Rock Creek, which drains into the Potomac River, and the scaling back of another large tunnel along the Potomac itself.

The notion of complementing gray infrastructure with green was a priority of George Hawkins when he became general manager of DC Water in 2009. It was not an easy sell. Clean-water advocates were skeptical of green infrastructure’s performance capability and also feared delays in achieving the goals of the Clean Rivers Project—to end 96 percent of the District of Columbia’s combined sewer overflows. Hawkins was able to make a case for the efficacy of green infrastructure and also to show that significant improvements to water quality would occur well before the tunnels’ projected completion.

The Clean Rivers program is deploying a mix of bioretention, porous pavements, rain barrels, and downspout disconnection from combined sewers. In the Rock Creek sewershed, enough green infrastructure is planned to manage (more…)

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