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Skip to content Primary Menu About Us Contact Us Follow The Field Submission Guidelines Search Search for: The Field ASLA Professional Practice Networks’ Blog Community Engagement in Times of Quarantine April 14, 2020 April 14, 2020 ASLA staff Leave a comment by Allysha Lorber, ASLA, and Elisabeth McCollum image: photo by Sue Zeng on Unsplash Just a few weeks ago, we didn’t anticipate being told to “stay-at-home” in quarantine while a global health pandemic ravaged public health and the economy. For those of us who work in the transportation industry, we’re used to projects lasting for years with a schedule of milestones set in place, one leading to the next. Spring is a time when many projects reach that critical milestone of a public meeting. Community engagement is part of the critical path, and project decisions can’t be made, allowing the project to advance, without meaningful opportunities to hear public input. How can we engage with communities when we must be “socially distant”? Projects across the country are being put on hold, unable to reach that critical milestone of a public meeting while our constituents are safely staying home, busy working overtime performing an essential service, or worse—battling sickness themselves. However, public engagement can still occur—even if it’s in a different form than we originally planned. Virtual public meetings aren’t new, but now more than ever, they are being embraced as an effective tool to engage with community members and project stakeholders. Meetings can be hosted on a variety of platforms allowing presenters to share presentations and discuss ideas with small groups of community members. These meetings can be advertised in all the same ways that traditional in-person meetings are publicized—on websites, through the press and social media, and by mail. Paid advertisements can also be effective at getting the word out and directing people to a website where they can connect. Continue reading → Transportation Allysha Lorber , Elisabeth McCollum Therapeutic Garden Design in Chile April 9, 2020 ASLA staff 2 Comments by Kat Shiffler, Student ASLA The Jacarandá Garden at San Borja Arriarán, a public hospital in Santiago. / image: Kat Shiffler I was drawn to landscape architecture out of a specific desire to create healthcare environments that help people heal. As I finish my second year of graduate school at the University of Michigan, I find myself working from an improvised home office instead of the design studio. My desk looks out upon a modest park, where I see record numbers of people walking, running, and sitting—absorbing the benefits of urban greenspace in these anxious times. Today, the universal importance of therapeutic design is thrown into high relief as the whole world is transformed into one big waiting room. In December, I traveled to Chile to check out some inspirational healthcare gardens and meet with the landscape architecture firm Fundación Cosmos . I interviewed the firm’s principals on their work, philosophy, and the state of the landscape architecture profession in Chile, and am sharing the conversation, with my translation into English, here on The Field . What inspires you to do this work? We are inspired to live in harmony with the environment, conscious of our interdependence with all living beings and our responsibility for the protection of ecological integrity which sustains life on earth. This is our vision as a foundation. Continue reading → Healthcare and Therapeutic Design Kat Shiffler April is World Landscape Architecture Month April 7, 2020 ASLA staff Leave a comment The Platte to Park Hill: Stormwater Systems project, featured in ASLA’s Joint Call to Action to Promote Healthy Communities conversation guide, “ A Stormwater Problem Becomes a Health Equity Opportunity .” / image: Livable Cities Studio Landscape architects and allied professionals have kicked off World Landscape Architecture Month 2020 and the Life Grows Here campaign with great energy, engaging through social media and virtual interactions to keep this annual international celebration of landscape architecture and designed public and private spaces going strong, despite the current circumstances. All are invited to participate in WLAM2020, from wherever you are, in celebration and recognition of the spaces landscape architects create. What’s happening this April for WLAM: How “Life Grows Here” Began: ASkLA Podcast – host Daniel Martin, Hon. ASLA, interviews the two members who originated the Life Grows Here campaign, Dalton LaVoie, ASLA, and Andrew Wickham, ASLA. Landscape Architecture Magazine – FREE access to April digital edition. ASLA Online Learning – FREE for ASLA members “Best of” webinar series from the 2019 ASLA Conference on Landscape Architecture. Instagram Stories Takeover – featuring Student and Professional Chapters working together to highlight their work. STEM Saturdays – showcasing projects that highlight all the reasons why landscape architecture is a STEM profession. Keep an eye on ASLA’s social media feeds on Instagram , Facebook , Twitter , and LinkedIn and the hashtags #WLAM2020 and #LifeGrowsHere for notable projects, practitioners, and progress in the field. Continue reading → From the Field In Case You Missed It: Environmental Justice PPN at ASLA San Diego April 2, 2020 April 2, 2020 ASLA staff Leave a comment by Tom Martin, Associate ASLA, and Chingwen Cheng, PhD, ASLA Tom Martin and Chingwen Cheng present at the 2019 ASLA Conference on Landscape Architecture / image: ASLA With the arrival of spring comes an opportunity for reflection, and four months have already passed since the ASLA Conference on Landscape Architecture in San Diego. The theme of landscape architecture and equity, inclusion, justice, and diversity was front and center in San Diego. As education sessions addressed these topics through the lens of profession demographics, engagement strategies, and the implications of past decisions, attendees were challenged to reconsider what the profession of landscape architecture can look like. Within the Environmental Justice Professional Practice Network (PPN), we spent the year leading up to the conference contemplating how environmental justice is understood within our profession, and how we might be able to develop and communicate frameworks that promote environmental justice as a tool for positive change. During our PPN Live session, we addressed our findings and action plan moving forward. Separated into three categories, below is a summary of what was presented. Investigate! In March 2019 we distributed a survey with the intent to understand landscape architects’ grasp of and level of interest in environmental justice. We saw this as being a vital first step toward enacting initiatives aimed at better integrating environmental justice into the profession of landscape architecture. Continue reading → Environmental Justice Chingwen Cheng , Tom Martin Resources for Distance Learning: Grow Your Ability to Adapt March 31, 2020 April 6, 2020 ASLA staff Leave a comment image: Slava Keyzman on Unsplash Keep learning, wherever you are. In ASLA’s 2017 Professional Practice Networks (PPNs) member survey, one question asked members to share one key piece of business advice on how to do well in landscape architecture. Among the top responses: cultivating a lifelong love of learning and adaptability. In times of disruption, those two characteristics may be more important than ever. Speculation is rampant, but no one knows how the next few weeks and months will unfold. Now is the time to expand your knowledge base and diversify what’s in your toolkit in order to make yourself more resilient when confronted with extreme uncertainty. Sharpening existing skills and adding new ones can help make you a more valuable team member and give you the flexibility to best respond to whatever may come your way. Landscape architects are used to dealing with change—it is an integral part ...