Wednesday, November 28, 2007

Raving Against Paving

“To build a road is so much simpler than to think of what the country really needs.”
Aldo Leopold


Our yearning for ‘hitting the road’ and exploring new terrain is an American obsession that predates the invention of the automobile. Early settlers moving westward via animal power established trails and encampments that spawned our culture’s unending desire to experience new places, see new sights, exploit resources and impose changes in land use patterns.

The introduction of the automobile, the development of suburbia and a national highway system gives most of us freedom and mobility to move as we choose but at what cost? The typical car commuter spends upwards of 90 minutes per day getting to and from work. Big-box stores – and their massive parking lots -- demark the ‘landscape’ everywhere, eschewing vernacular architecture and land patterns. The paved land in the United States totals an area greater than Georgia; nearly two-thirds of Los Angeles is said to be covered in asphalt; we lay enough new blacktop each year to cover all of the state of Delaware; so many logging roads dissect national forests that the U.S. Forest Service qualifies as one of the world’s largest road building agencies (see Landscape Architecture #85, 2003).

So many roads crisscross the United States that it might be time to consider something radical: road removal. Why? Roads introduce pollution to an area from the time construction begins. Creating a roadbed removes vegetation and increases erosion. Construction of a divided highway can produce as much as 3,000 tons of eroded sediment per mile. Vehicles traveling on roadways produce carcinogenic or toxic emissions: carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, ozone, benzene, heavy metals, etc. Maintenance of roads brings more contamination. Oil products seep into water and poison aquatic life; herbicides inhibit biodiversity and remove desirable species along roadsides; de-icing saline-based products sicken animals and stimulate algae in drainage areas. Roads disturb hydrology: annual runoff from Washington, D.C. area roads carries more spilled oil than the Exxon Valdez.

Road-generated noise pollution proliferates into neighboring communities altering human and animal patterns. An estimated one million animals are ‘road-killed’ every day. US human fatalities average close to 40,000 annually. Taxpayers spend upwards of $200 million per day on roadways. The list goes on and on…

Is road removal worth considering? Organizations such as the Road Removal Implementation Project (ROAD-RIP) think yes. ROAD-RIP focuses its attention on the roads on public wildlands –areas overseen by the Bureau of Land Management – such as national parks, national forests, wildlife refuges. Working as a coalition of wilderness/preservation groups, ROAD-RIP works to identify roads deemed most damaging to wildlands and seeks to get them removed. Road removal means complete removal: removing all pavement and the compacted sub-base; restoring natural grade and replanting the entire area with native species. Successful projects to date include work in California’s Redwood National Park.

Are users of roadways in our Public domain ready for road removal? Judging by our television ads touting automobiles the answer seems a resounding no. But public sector roadways could benefit from redesign features: developing transit nodes – combining park and ride lots with bikeways and trains; retrofitting existing roadways with high-occupancy vehicle lanes; introducing alternative pavement materials – such as porous asphalt; eliminating at all costs the desire to build new super highways.

Our landscapes and our way of life are defined by pavement and our desire to drive in individual cars on it. Don’t think so? Try, for just one day, to eliminate using your personal automobile to go about doing the rituals of your daily routine. Maybe our best long term solution isn’t to rave against paving but to become more aware of the ramifications of paving. Insist that designers and government agencies redesign communities to maximize pedestrian, bicycle and transit access. Promote the viewpoint that open space remain open and encourage cluster development in new site design so that larger areas can be road-free. Use your home landscape as a perfect testing ground, a living laboratory, for attempting to make a new landscape order.

Monday, November 12, 2007

"Anyone can sell a good product, but to sell a piece of crap, now that takes real talent." Is 'Design' and 'Handwerk' increasingly less valued?

There appears to be a growing misconception in mainstream America about just what exactly is ‘design,’ its value to the individual, and the culture at large. Big-box stores, mass media outlets, educational institutes and even the “design disciplines”– to name just a few entities – can share the blame for muddying the term. In many circles design is a commodity, produced by a recipe, cranked out, apparently, by anyone. In this line of thinking – propelled by mass-marketing forces – there is no such thing as ‘bad design’ …and very little ‘site-specific design.’ This ‘one size-fits-all, rip and read’ approach to design has produced another disturbing trend: an increasing de-valuation in ‘handwerk.’ And begs the question: just what does distinguish the artist from the artisan?

It’s interesting to note that within the discipline of studio arts, artists and artisans share at least one thing in common: the desire and need to make something tangible, real and honest. Most are willing to acknowledge that in the very making come the creative ideas, the understanding of their design process, and quality work.

Why is it that those in the “design disciplines” – particularly architects and landscape architects – more often than not dismiss with scorn and intellectual indifference their brethren who choose to design with a hands-on approach?

Perhaps tradition plays an important role in fostering these attitudes. Painters, sculptors, jewelers, ceramists, and furniture designers, to name a few, must first learn basic skills of their craft --often in art schools like I attended – before ever hoping to truly conceive and design works of art.

This is rarely the case in the design disciplines. For example, many landscape architects admittedly claim little knowledge about soils, plants and climate, lack practical hands-on knowledge about construction methods (even the basics such as planting a tree, building a bench or a walkway), and seemingly are disdainful of those who do. Yet they consider themselves artful designers, relying upon their training (largely conceptual) as a pedigree for success. We expect artisans to understand the properties of metal, wood, concrete and fiberglass before we hire them as metalsmiths, furniture designers, home builders and boat makers. So why do we train students to become professional architects and landscape architects who have never laid a hand on wood, steel, stone and soil?

As in all the design professions, there is a tremendous amount of diverse knowledge needed to work in one’s chosen field. The profession of landscape architecture is no different. On the one hand, it’s a small, specialized field encompassing engineering, horticulture, sociology, sculpture and such basic design elements as texture and color. On the other hand, its all about production and has little to do with anything creative and everything to do with the making of things that sell and make money. Art or craft made by artists or artisans? I guess we all have our opinions on that. It’s time those of us who choose to make and design appreciate our tactile, artful nature, celebrate our craftiness and revel in our uniqueness. And for all of us to ponder these words penned from the late author and social critic Norman Mailer: "corporations used to have some pride in their products. Now they have pride in their marketing...Anyone can sell a good product, but to sell a piece of crap, now that takes real talent."