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“Landscape architects have unique skills that can change the world,” said Lucinda Sanders, FASLA, CEO of OLIN, in her introduction of the Landscape Architecture Foundation (LAF) Leadership and Innovation Fellowship Program at the Howard Theater in Washington, D.C.
The latest class of six fellows represent the “future of disruption.” During their fellowship, they investigated seemingly intractable problems and found fresh solutions. “They have profound messages to offer us.”
Here, we look at three fellows who delved into the complexities of enhancing biodiversity, preserving cultural spaces, and decarbonizing landscapes:
Over the past fifty years, there has been a 69 percent decline in the population of mammals, birds, fish, amphibians, and reptiles worldwide. And insect populations have seen an even steeper decline: a drop of 75 percent in the last twenty-five years and 41 percent in just this past decade. “It’s an insect apocalypse,” said landscape designer Betsy Peterson, Assoc. ASLA, founder of August Design Collaborative.
“Insects aren’t pests.” They provide critical ecosystem services — from pollination to decomposition. And as famed biologist E.O. Wilson noted, “if we were to wipe out insects alone on this planet, the rest of life and humanity with it would mostly disappear from the land within a few months.”
Insect populations are collapsing because of habitat loss, the widespread use of pesticides and fungicides, the spread of invasive species, and climate change.
While large-scale restoration efforts are important, “tiny yards matter” too, Peterson said. Any yard can be designed to provide habitat for a range of species. Connected together, they can form ecological corridors.
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In the UK, where Peterson lives, yard gardens take up more space than all the country’s nature reserves put together. In contrast, in the U.S., lawns take up more land than the country’s corn fields They are “death traps for insects,” but represent a major opportunity.
Peterson looked to the WWII Victory Gardens for inspiration. By 1945, 40 percent of American household food came from these humble plots. She calls for Biodiversity Victory Gardens and has created a set of accessible tools, including colorful posters, to help transform toxic lawns into beautiful habitat for insects and birds (see image at top).
“Basketball courts are essential,” argued Johnny Macon, ASLA, a lecturer at Morgan State University. “We need to preserve and celebrate the experiences” of these spaces, which underpin cultural identity in many communities.
In the 1970s, 80s, and 90s, from New York to Baltimore, basketball courts played a central role in the development of hip-hop culture.
Reflecting on his youth, going to basketball courts in Baltimore, he said “you could sit outside, talk, hear an MC and music, and watch a marching band and the performance of the basketball players.”
Basketball predates the 1970s, when it grew in popularity. Macon views courts as a continuation of African “performative communal spaces.” Today, they are where Black people can safely get together and transmit cultural traditions carried over the Atlantic ocean.
Basketball courts shape “how we move and act in public — call and response, synchronization, improvisation.” They provide space to “clap, sing, and dance.” They are where Black people can express their “sense of style and express joy.”
He called on landscape architects to make room for courts in their future designs — and to make them high-quality spaces. “Embrace them instead of excluding or ignoring them. These places matter.”
The climate crisis is urgent. Landscape architects add greenhouse gases to the atmosphere every time they use concrete and other carbon-intensive materials. “A radical shift is needed. We can’t have incremental change,” said Meg Calkins, FASLA, professor, NC State University.
To reduce the embodied carbon from concrete, landscape architects can specify low-carbon mixes, use less material to hit minimum strength requirements, and shift to cement alternatives.
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For typical landscape features like pavement, fences, decks, and retaining walls, Calkins encouraged designers to use local, flexible materials and nature-based solutions.
She compared the carbon impacts of typical materials in a few scenarios. She found that stone, gravel, and woods outperform concrete and steel in terms of embodied carbon emissions. Local materials also come with lower transportation emissions.
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With wood, there is also an opportunity to store carbon. Calkins recommended domestic thermally-modified ash wood, which also avoids the ecological damage that comes with the extraction of tropical hardwoods like Ipe.
Calkins wants to see a decrease in the consumption of new materials overall. “We have already mined and built so much. Lets shift towards smaller structures, using materials longer, and the circular economy.”
Nearly two-thirds of demolition debris goes into the waste stream. “We can mine the built environment, not the natural environment.” With renewable and regenerative materials, landscape architects can lead an “aesthethic shift.”
Look out for Calkins’ upcoming book: Details and Materials for Resilient Sites: A Carbon Positive Approach.