LAF is recommended for a $25,000 grant to support the Summer 2012 Case Study Investigation (CSI) program. CSI is a unique research collaboration that matches LAF-funded student-faculty research teams with leading practitioners to document the benefits of exemplary high-performing landscape projects. Ten research teams will participate in the Summer 2012, and the NEA grant will fund half of the $5,000 stipend paid to the student Research Assistant on each team.

“We are thrilled that NEA is investing in this research to show the environmental, economic, and social value of exemplary design,” said LAF Executive Director Barbara Deutsch, ASLA.

The NEA received 1,624 eligible applications for this round of Art Works funding. The 788 Art Works grants total $24.81 million and support the creation of art that meets the highest standards of excellence, public engagement with diverse and excellent art, lifelong learning in the arts, and the strengthening of communities through the arts. Visit the NEA website for a complete listing of projects recommended for Art Works grant support.

Participating firms were selected based on the the quality of projects submitted, potential to produce comprehensive quantified benefits, availability of baseline information, and commitment to the research collaboration. Practitioners provide the background information and narrative for projects, help identify potential performance benefits and information to quantify them, and provide the faculty-student research teams with access to key project personnel, photos, documents, clients, and other stakeholders.

The collaborations are now underway — look for updates throughout the summer and new Case Study Briefs in the fall from these participating firms and projects:

• AECOM's Stuyvesant Cove Waterfront Open SpaceAECOM
  Stuyvesant Cove Waterfront Open Space
• Beijing Tsinghua Urban Planning & Design Institute
  Beijing Olympic Forest Park
  Tangshan Nanhu Eco-city Central Park
• The Berger Partnership
  Magnuson Park Wetlands
• CDF, Inc.
  Queens Botanical Garden Visitor Center
  Charles City Permeable Streetscape
• Design Workshop
  EDSA's Castigilon del BoscoCherry Creek North & Fillmore Plaza
  South Grand Boulevard Great Streets Initiative
  Park Avenue/ Highway 50
• Ecological Landscape Design & Restoration
  Stone Mill at the New York Botanical Garden
• EDSA
  Castiglion del Bosco
• EPT Design
  Frontier Project
  Sonia Sotomayor Learning Academies
• Jones and Jones
  Cedar Lake Park and Trail
• KMS Design Group
  Black Rock Sanctuary
• Mia Lehrer + Associates
  Vista Hermosa Natural Park
• MIG, Inc.
  Reed Hilderbrand's Central Wharf PlazaWest San Gabriel River Parkway Nature Trail
• Mithun
  Eden Hall Campus at Chatham University
  High Point
  Hubbard Homestead Park
• Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority
  Tunjunga Wash Greenway
• OLIN
  Celebrezze Federal Building Plaza
• Frederick Law Olmsted
  Back Bay Fens
• Reed Hilderbrand
  SWA Group's Cross Creek RanchCentral Wharf Plaza
• Sasaki
  The Avenue
• SWA Group
  Cross Creek Ranch
• TBG
  Park Seventeen
• UW Campus Sustainability Fund
  Biodiversity Green Wall & Water Harvesting System
• Wells Appel
  Pennswood Village Regional Storm Water Quality and Management System

Friday, April 27, 2012

The Center for Architecture
536 La Guardia Place, New York, NY 10012

As part of the New York Chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects’ High-Performance Lecture Series, LAF Executive Director Barbara Deutsch will present the Landscape Performance Series and how to quantify performance benefits. Each of these 1-hour sessions qualifies for one LACES HSW CEU. Presentations will be followed by a networking cocktail reception.

High Performance Landscapes #4: Think Globally, Design Locally, Quantify the Benefits

     Greg Searle, Executive Director, BioRegional North America
     1:15-2:10pm   Ecological Footprinting and One Planet Communities Case Studies  
     2:15-3:10pm   Engaging Residents: Designing and Operating for Sustainable Lifestyles

     Barbara Deutsch, ASLA, Executive Director, Landscape ArchitectureFoundation
     3:30-4:25pm   A Primer on LAF’s Landscape Performance Series
     4:30-5:25pm   How to Quantify Benefits of Your High Performance Landscapes

Register Online
Members (ASLA, AIA, Hort): $79.00
Non-Members: $99.00 
Students: $39.00

Research Fellows lead the case study preparation, work with firms to identify performance benefits of select projects, and develop methods for data collection. They also receive an honorarium and funding to support a student research assistant. These select faculty members provide expertise in quantifying landscape benefits, and the academic rigor that is needed to support designers, policy-makers, and advocates who are making the case for sustainable landscape solutions.

The following LAF Research Fellows will lead the ten Summer 2012 Case Study Investigation teams:

• Barry Lehrman, Cal Poly Pomona
• Molly Mehling, PhD, Chatham University
• Jessica Canfield, Kansas State University
• Claudia Goetz Phillips, PhD, Philadelphia University
• Mary Myers, PhD, Temple University
• Ming Han Li, PhD, Texas A&M University
  Bruce Dvorak, Texas A&M University
• Bo Yang, PhD, Utah State University
• Victoria Chanse, PhD, University of Maryland

• Chris Ellis, PhD, University of Maryland
  Byoung-Suk Kweon, PhD, University of Maryland

• Nancy Rottle, University of Washington

The selection process was highly competitive, with the number of proposals indicating the strong level of enthusiasm for the CSI program. CSI provides a unique opportunity for faculty to sharpen research skills, build relationships with top landscape architecture firms, collaborate with peers, and gain national exposure as thought leaders.

Projects and firms selected for participation in the Summer 2012 CSI program will be announced in April.

Sponsors that commit by April 20 will receive an invitation to an exclusive dinner reception in Washington, DC on May 4, as well as a private reception hosted at Kornegay Design on Sept 27 in Phoenix. These private events provide coveted opportunities to interact in a small-group setting with members of the LAF Board of Directors, leaders in practice, academia, and industry.

2011 Annual Benefit Sponsors enjoy a private reception with the LAF Board and staff.

What did last year’s sponsors say about supporting LAF’s Annual Benefit?

     “Great opportunity to network with leading
     landscape architects from around the country.”

     “We enjoyed getting to meet the board members
     and see how our firm can assist their firms. We
     also enjoyed learning more about LAF and how it
     can apply to our industry.”

     “Your organization is good for our industry.
     Thanks for all you do!”

     “We enjoyed the private reception. It was a great
     night and we felt honored to be there. We would
     love to continue as a sponsor and see how we can
     assist more as we move forward with our
     relationship. We believe that by having limited
     sponsors per certain industries helps as it makes
     us feel very special.”

To take advantage of this exclusive opportunity, download  a Sponsor Registration Form or contact Matt Alcide at malcide@lafoundation.org or 202-331-7070 x13.

LAF’s 2011 Annual Benefit raised over $140,000 to support LAF’s research and scholarship programs. With your support, we expect 2012 to be an even greater success!

Four sessions on Landscape Performance will kick off the Research & Methods track with presentations and panel discussions from LAF staff, 2011 CSI Research Fellows, and other key leaders in the movement to set performance objectives and quantify benefits.

LAF will also have an exhibitor table, hold a training for the soon-to-be-announced 2012 Case Study Investigation (CSI) Fellows, and host a roundtable discussion on developing a national research agenda. More details are below.

We hope to see you there!

Research & Methods Track

Session 1 - Wed, 2:00-3:20pm
Landscape Performance: Documenting the Benefits of Sustainable Landscape Solutions

Panel with:      Barbara Deutsch, ASLA, Landscape Architecture Foundation
                          Linda Ashby, ASLA, Landscape Architecture Foundation
                          Forster Ndubisi, PhD, ASLA, Texas A&M University
                          Christopher D. Ellis, PhD, University of Maryland

Session 2 - Wed, 4:30-5:30pm
Landscape Performance: Methods to Quantify Benefits

Presentations:   Lessons from LAF’s Landscape Performance Series
                              Heather Whitlow, Landscape Architecture Foundation

                              The Salvation Army Kroc Community Center Case Study
                              Mary Myers, PhD, RLA, ASLA, Temple University

Panel with:          Heather Whitlow, Landscape Architecture Foundation
                              Christopher D. Ellis, PhD, University of Maryland
                              Elen Deming, PhD, University of Illinois
                              Mary Myers, PhD, RLA, ASLA, Temple University

Session 3 - Thur, 8:30-9:50am
Presentations Based on 2011 Case Study Investigation (CSI) Research

Presentations:   Water Conservation in Master-Planned Communities in the Intermountain West
                              Bo Yang, PhD, Utah State University

                              Assessing Social Benefit of Green Space: POE of Lubert Plaza
                              Mary Myers, PhD, RLA, ASLA, Temple University

                              Performance benefits: The case of the Kresge Foundation Headquarters
                              Byoung-Suk Kweon, PhD, University of Maryland

                              Measuring Landscape Performance at Uptown Normal Circle and Streetscape
                              Christopher D. Ellis, PhD, University of Maryland

Session 4 - Thur, 10:00-11:20am
Moving Forward: Integrating Landscape Performance in Academia and Practice

Panel with:         Barbara Deutsch, ASLA Landscape Architecture Foundation
                             Kristina Hill, PhD, University of Virginia
                             Nancy Rottle, ASLA, University of Washington
                             Kurt Culbertson, FASLA, Design Workshop

2012 CSI Research Fellows Meeting

Wed, 3:30-4:20pm
Meet & Greet and Training
Case Study Investigation (CSI) program overview from LAF staff for faculty members selected as 2012 LAF Research Fellows.

Research Agenda Roundtable

Thurs, 1:00-2:00pm
Toward a National Research Agenda
Work session with LAF, Design Workshop, invited academics and pratitioners to discuss the benefits, pros, and cons of a national research agenda for the profession.

For my Masters degree work I was fortunate to collaborate with a team of students at the University of Michigan’s School of Natural Resources and Environment. Our project helped community members and tribal employees with the planning and design of a non-motorized trail system in the Jocko Valley, on the Flathead Reservation in Montana. My team included two landscape architecture students: Robin Burke and myself; Meredith Bohdan, an Environmental Policy and Planning student; and two Behavior, Education, and Communication students: Ann Kelley and Brittney Van Der Werff. Working with this team helped me realize the true interdisciplinary nature of landscape architecture. We worked closely with the Jocko Valley Trails Committee and the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribal (CSKT) government, through meetings and public outreach, to create trail design recommendations. On a broader scale, we researched the current status of trail systems on American Indian reservations throughout the United States.

Sketch-up models helped illustrate pedestrian bridge options.

During May of 2010, we spent an intensive four weeks working on the project in Arlee, Montana, a town of 600 people located at the southern end of the Flathead Reservation. We engaged the community in trail planning activities, conducted site visits, and met with project partners. We distributed a survey to gauge community interest in trails development, hosted an open house, and conducted Youth Visioning Workshops with over 150 high school, middle school, and 4th grade students.

Site visits acquainted us with areas of specific design concern, including the Demonstration Reach portion of the Jocko River Restoration Area, where the CSKT Natural Resources Department sought to develop an interpretive trail system. The Demonstration Reach marks the beginning of 22 miles of state-of-the-art river restoration work the tribe is performing, using natural channel design along with passive restoration techniques, to create habitat for endangered bull trout. Other areas of concern included Highway 93’s Jocko River Bridge, a dangerous 400-foot span that lacks pedestrian facilities.

For the Demonstration Reach trail designs, ink drawings conveyed the rustic feel of the area.

A simple log bridge over the Jocko River.

After returning to Michigan we spent the next year developing three conceptual interpretive trail designs, supported by detailed site inventories and analyses. These options worked within CSKT’s constraints to showcase the impressive ecological restoration work the tribe had accomplished and educate about the natural history and conservation needs of bull trout. We analyzed the data we gathered from community activities to provide specific design solutions including pedestrian crossing options for the Jocko River Bridge area, trail alignments, and planting designs.

Finally, inspired by the leadership of the Arlee community, we wrote a paper entitled Trails on Tribal Land: Understanding the Challenges and Benefits of Trail Planning and Development for American Indian Communities. This paper was a compilation of both literature review and interviews conducted with natural resource managers, scientists, planners, and other decision makers from 22 reservations throughout the United States. The full project is available here: http://hdl.handle.net/2027.42/83543.

Nick Deyo received his Masters of Landscape Architecture from the University of Michigan in May 2011. He lives in Tucson, Arizona where he is engaged with conservation planning and ecological restoration projects working for the NGO Sky Island Alliance.

As a designer, if you look around your city at all the vacant wasted space, it is hard to resist imagining what could be. And, you may be surprised how many people have similar ideas. With the momentum of the local food movement, an increasingly popular solution is the temporary community garden. Growing fresh locally-sourced food provides health, environmental, social and cultural benefits that are a boon to any neighbor or restaurant.

Orlando, Florida has a growing foundation of people and resources behind its local food movement. Chefs, community-supported agriculture (CSAs), food truck owners, journalists, social entrepreneurs and local “foodies” alike, have all been advocating and pursuing a sustainable local food economy. The downtown area has a high concentration of working young professionals growing more aware of slow food and the systems that empower the contrasting industrial food economy that is in place.

As I have become familiar with the area, I have noticed a huge opportunity at the core of the food system: the potential for urban farming. Using my passion and interest in urban agriculture and productive landscapes in general, I began working to fill the gap between community interest and a local food system to support it. I focused on the Lake Eola area of downtown Orlando, which has a robust Sunday farmer’s market and a high concentration of creative, intelligent, and like-minded young people who care about their community and their health.

Mapping of local farms and gardens across Orlando with the Eola Urban Farm shown in blue.

Surveying vacant parcels for urban farming opportunities was fast-tracked once I connected with an innovative and motivated developer in the Orlando area, who understood that his monthly operations and maintenance costs could be reduced by allowing us to convert the vacant land into a productive use. After navigating the city’s red tape through a cumbersome permiting and legal process, the Eola Urban Farm was born and is ready for growing.

Despite these success, a number of unanswered questions remain that are the source of continual debate:

Business and Operations Plans
I work full-time as a landscape architect, and my other partners also have permanent jobs. Although we want to be involved in the farming and community outreach, who will manage and maintain the farm every day? Formulating the right business plan has been difficult. We have had an outpouring of interest from community members, however, defining exactly what the farm is and how it operates has been a difficult concept for the commuity to grasp. Our vision is not for a community garden, but a privately-operated urban farm that supplements the food supply of selected restaurants and businesses, with occasional community, volunteer, and education days on the farm.

Organic vs. Conventional Farming
This topic has generated the most debate amongst interested community members. The team agrees that the ideal scenario is a beautiful, thriving organic urban farm, yet some have voiced the opinion that conventional farming methods might be better to get the farm established. As Michael Pollan, eloquently discusses in his book, The Omnivore’s Dilemma, we may buy organic produce shipped 1,500 miles from an industrial organic farm when we could have supported a local food system that uses conventional farming methods — which is more sustainable?

Recycled cargo shipping containers help to solve the temporal issues of urban agriculture systems.

Impermanence
Although urban farming is a creative and innovative use for much of our uncertain and underutilized land, how do we design for its temporary nature? The Eola Urban Farm will make use of recycled cargo shipping containers that have been re-fabricated for the farm and can be used for equipment storage, rotating art galleries, hydroponics, and rain water harvesting. They will incorporate green roof systems to maximize the food yield of the site.

The greatest advantage of these containers is mobility, since the farm does have a timeline. When a hotel eventually decides to build on the site, the developer will move forward with those plans. The “mobile farm” design will allow the developer to establish another vacant lot as the new downtown farm, without destroying the operating and distribution systems that have been established. This model has the potential to invigorate various areas of the city over the life span of the farm. It will become a mobile entity that has tangible food and health benefits and delivers vital social and cultural benefits.

A major goal of the Eola Urban Farm is to raise awareness and advocate for local food and urban agriculture in our downtown. Part of this process is creating change within the city government to make it easier for these systems to be established. Throughout my research and outreach, many experienced farmers and gardeners have told me the same thing: “Growing food should be a simple process — do not make it overly complex. With proper growing conditions you can throw seeds in the ground and your food will grow.” As we have gathered bright and motivated individuals to help run the farm, we plan to have healthy spring and summer growing and harvest seasons.

Chris Merritt is a landscape designer at AECOM in Orlando, Florida. Previously, Chris spent one year with Sasaki Associates in Boston. He graduated from the Purdue University Landscape Architecture program, where he was recognized with the ASLA Student Merit Award in addition to being an LAF University Olmsted Scholar.



How is landscape performance best incorporated into the LA curriculum? How might LAF’s Landscape Performance Series (LPS) contribute to landscape architecture education and the future practice of our current students?

These are questions that underlay incorporation of the LPS and Case Study Investigation (CSI) model into the graduate curriculum at the University of Washington during the 2011 autumn term. Collaborating with LAF, my Landscape Performance seminar tackled the production of a dozen case studies for projects that ranged from parks to schools to zoo exhibits, in the Pacific Northwest and in China.

The case study work replaced the usual term paper for my Sustainable Urban Landscapes course, which has focused on landscape performance for the last two years. The seminar readings and discussions examine concepts and practices related to the design of sustainable urban landscapes, engaging such theories as green infrastructure, green and sustainable urbanism, landscape urbanism, regenerative and closed-loop design and landscape metrics. The twist of working within the CSI collaborative model immersed students into a more interactive approach to studying performing landscapes.

Preparation for the class began over the summer, as LAF Research Assistant Pam Emerson and I met with several firms to identify and vet candidate projects for case studies. A primary qualification was the existence of performance data to adequately quantify benefits of a built project. We narrowed our list of applicable projects to the most promising, and collected as much data in advance as the firms could supply. Pam also learned the processes, resources, and issues the students would face by developing two case studies of her own.

During the autumn seminar, students worked in pairs, assisting one another in gathering data and learning the various landscape evaluation tools. They received regular feedback from me, our Teaching Assistant Delia Lacson (also a LAF Research Assistant), from each other, and from LAF. An invited guest panel of experts described various tools, resources and metrics systems, including Mithun/LBJ Wildflower Center’s carbon calculator, valuation of ecosystem services from Earth Economics, components in the i-tree suite, Seattle parks maintenance data, and Sustainable Sites program resources, especially those related to human health and well-being. The case studies went through three phases of review, including a penultimate review by the sponsoring design firm, before students submitted their final versions to LAF.

Our learning from tackling these case studies underscored, yet transcended, student awareness of the value of incorporating landscape performance goals in the design process. Students in the seminar expressed that it was valuable to learn about the tools and parameters used to design and evaluate high-performing landscapes, to gain in-depth knowledge about a particular designed landscape and its actual benefits, and to learn lessons not only from successes but also from the failures that are unfortunately so common in built landscapes (such as from soil compaction or introduction of weed seeds). The process was also a first-hand lesson in how critical it is to have adequate baseline data and inside knowledge from those involved in the design process.

Measuring and documenting the performance of landscapes is required to reshape the teaching and practice of landscape architecture so that our built landscapes actually provide the desired benefits we hope to achieve. Such measurement and communication are critical to the acceptance and culture of new landscape aesthetics, within the profession and in value formation and demands from our public and private clients. We found the pilot of this model, though still evolving, to be a critical first step in introducing students to this discussion.

LAF appreciates the dedicated work of all those involved with the 2011 UW LARCH 561 course: 2011 LAF Research Fellow Nancy Rottle, Research Assistants Pam Emerson and Delia Lacson, Ximena Bustamante, Sue Costa, Peter Cromwell, Dafer Haddadin , Chen Hai, Taj Hanson, Manami Iwamija, Jo Ming Lau, Audrey Maloney, Jessica Michalak, Haruna Nemoto, Roma Shah, Karin Strelioff, Tao Xu, Xiaobing Wang, Virginia Werner, Ying-Ju Yeh.

Last November, I found myself on a plane to St. Croix for the second time in a little over a year. The first time I’d visited the island I was in the company of my senior studio class as we embarked on a five-day site visit to prepare for a semester project of exploring masterplan concepts for one of the island’s National Parks.

My involvement in that project extended beyond that semester studio, and in late October I was offered the opportunity to return to St. Croix and work with local stakeholders to increase cooperation and community involvement in the design process. While I learned many things during my five weeks on the island, the concept of place was one topic that stood out and continues to resonate with me.

I have been thinking about place for a while now. As designers of places, I think this is key to our work as a profession, and thinking deeply about the issue of place can only sharpen our ability to respect and enhance it. I’ve been fortunate to watch my understanding of St Croix shift and grow from the first time I heard someone utter its name all the way up to the end of my 5-week stay. Each form of interaction led to a different level of understanding of place.

Some of the strangest moments to me after being on the island for 5 weeks were when I came across a place that I had previously visited with my class. Despite how eager I had been to understand St. Croix, I was always struck by my impression of the place then, and my knowledge of it now. I had a similar experience the day I interviewed a local woman named Francillia about the Easter camping tradition on the beach. Before that conversation, my impression of the campers was that they were rowdy, littering, and although fun-loving had a general disrespect for the beach and the natural areas around it. I was amazed to realize that, on the contrary, the tradition was her family’s way of engaging the natural world — a choice to stop everyday life, forgo electricity and distractions, and form a community under the stars.

This encounter made me realize that even with the best of intentions people can be misunderstood and perceptions blown far out of proportion. The learning curve in understanding a place is absolutely fascinating, but it is also somewhat frightening because I am beginning to realize how much effort is required to move far enough along that curve to truly understand the places in which we design. As Landscape Architects if we do not understand the place, how can we design spaces that work within the culture they reside?

Place has remained a resonating question in my mind. After St. Croix, I left my home in Queens, New York and moved across the country to South Lake Tahoe, California to work with Design Workshop. Once again I find myself in a completely different place, with a different landscape and culture. Several of the projects that I am currently involved in are sites that I have never stepped foot on and only know through photos, aerials and maps. Given the practical parameters we face as designers — time, cost and distance being the most significant — I believe the essential question that needs to be asked is: How do we make the most of the time we have on a site in order to develop a rigorous understanding of place that can reliably drive analysis and design? I believe that it is through finding solutions to this question that we will be enabled to create powerful, place-based designs.

Sarah Nitchman recieved her Bachelors degree in Landscape Architecture from Rutgers University in May 2011. After graduating she spent five weeks in both Germany and St. Croix and is currently interning with Design Workshop’s Lake Tahoe office.