April 23, 2013
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in Urban Design
via Jesse Stemmler and Rachel Hill, Mt. Hood Section Co-Chairs
WHAT: Green Roofs 2.0 - The Next Generation of Technology and Design
WHEN: May 16th, 12:00-1:30pm
WHERE: Lobby of the ASA Flats and Lofts, 1200 NW Marshall Street, Portland, OR
COST: $10 ASLA Members / $14 Non-Members
LIMIT: 15 person maximum
Take a break from your day and join us for the 2nd edition of the Urban Green series. The experts at Portland’s Bureau of Environmental Services are leading a noon-day tour of two of Portland’s signature green roofs. Via a walking tour of the roofs in the Pearl, we will explore burgeoning technologies and practices in green roof design while discussing the lessons learned from past projects. Don’t miss this opportunity to join fellow landscape architects and green roof experts to explore the green roof design, trends, and technologies that shape our building-top spaces.
Contact Jesse Stemmler for more information.
Meeting Flyer - Post it in your office!
Urban Green PDH Event Homepage
April 20, 2013
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in Urban Design
via Liz Rhodes, The Center for Architecture
PLACE studio: The trend of creative placemaking by Mauricio J. Villarreal and Charles W. Brucker
Join the Center for Architecture for our first Flash Lectures on Friday, April 26th, 4pm-5pm. Mauricio Villarreal and Charles Brucker will be discussing their landscape architecture firm’s approach toward placemaking and creating environments that capitalizes on a community’s potential and creating good public spaces that promote people’s health, happiness, and well being.
MAURICIO VILLARREAL, PLA, ASLA - Principal
Mauricio Villarreal is an award-winning landscape architect and a co-founder of the Portland-based PLACE, a globally integrated design studio focused on the craft of placemaking. The hallmark of his dynamic career spanning more than 25 years of experience is in collaboration with fellow professionals creating environments that embrace green development practices, explore innovative approaches toward landscape architectural design and urbanism, and provide vital spaces for generations to enjoy.
CHARLES BRUCKER, PLA, ASLA - Principal
Recently co-founding a design workshop, PLACE studio, Charles Brucker is a registered landscape architect with 20 years of experience creating spaces that evoke an association with nature and provide stewardship of land. A diverse span of notable LEED projects in Charlie’s professional portfolio demonstrate his understanding and appreciation of diverse communities and their respective social, historic, and cultural values in the context of landscape architecture. Integrating green infrastructure in planning and design process and garnering public support to promote an environmentally sensitive quality of life, Charles strives to balance visionary yet pragmatic settings for projects across the Pacific Northwest.
FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC
When: Friday, April 26th, 2013
Time: 4pm-5pm
Location: The Center For Architecture, 403 NW 11th Avenue Portland, Oregon 97209
RSVP Here
April 7, 2013
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in Urban Design
via Portland Bureau of Environmental Services
Portland Ecoroof Symposium
Thursday May 2nd, 2013
World Trade Conference Center
121 SW Salmon Street, 2WTC
Portland, Oregon 97204
Cities across the world are investing in green roofs to combat urban challenges. Portland is a leader in green roofs, and we’ve learned a great deal about their benefits for managing stormwater and greening our city. We’re learning more all the time about the true costs and benefits of green roofs and how they offer a better return on investment. On Thursday May 2, 2013, join the City of Portland for a series of presentations and case studies that detail current research examining the green roof bottom line.
Who should attend?
Architects, landscape architects, designers, developers, building owners and managers, planners, engineers, and green roof professionals
What is the cost to attend?
Registration is $25. Space is limited, advance registration is required.
MORE INFORMATION
REGISTER TO ATTEND
April 7, 2013
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in Urban Design
via Portland Parks and Recreation
Portland Parks & Recreation and the Portland Development Commission, along with our valued community partners, invite you to join us on Friday, May 17, 2013, at 12:00 pm for the grand opening of The Fields Park. The celebration will be highlighted by appearances by City and community leaders, a musical performance and art exhibit by neighborhood school children, light refreshments, and much more! The Fields, the newest park in the Rose City, is scheduled to open to the public on May 6. It is located in northwest Portland on NW 10th Ave. and Overton.
PROJECT OVERVIEW
Design and construct a new neighborhood park in northwest Portland.
Project Partners
Portland Parks & Recreation, Portland Development Commission, Pearl District Neighborhood Association
Project Advisory Committee (PAC)
Keith Thomajan, Patricia Gardner, Lisa Hamilton, Anita Kissee-Wilder, Catherine Levi, Steve Pinger, Linda Salinsky, Jillian Smith, Steve Young
PROJECT SCHEDULE
March 2012 - March 2013: Construction
May 6, 2013: Park opening to the public
May 17, 2013: Opening Celebration
PROJECT BACKGROUND
This is the third park that was outlined in the Portland River District Park System Urban Design Framework Study (January 2001). The study included planning and design concepts for four parks within the Urban renewal Area (URA) located between NW 10 and 11 Avenues, beginning at NW Johnson. The four parks include Jamison Square (completed 2002), Tanner Springs (completed 2005), The Fields (to be completed 2008), and a potential Riverfront Park. The Fields is situated within the Hoyt Street Yards portion of the Pearl District Neighborhood Association (PDNA).
In the early 1900s, the Pearl District was a major industrial and transportation hub of Portland, with extensive rail yards, warehousing, and manufacturing facilities. In the 1950s, many industrial activities were relocated as transportation patterns shifted from water and rail to surface transit on interstate highways and air. The low rents that soon followed created spaces for artists and small businesses.
The Pearl District of today began in the early 1980s with extensive planning efforts to convert warehouses and rail yards into mixed use development. Pearl District redevelopment gained momentum in the 1990s which resulted in urban mixed use with multi-family residential buildings, offices, and a broad range of retail shops and services
March 10, 2013
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in Urban Design
via Steven Koch, Koch Landscape Architecture
The innovative series of downtown Portland fountain plazas by world-renowned landscape architect Lawrence Halprin has been listed in the National Register of Historic Places, according to the Oregon State Historic Preservation Office.
Known individually as Keller Fountain, Pettygrove Park, Lovejoy Fountain, and the Source Fountain, the public plazas are located between SW Clay and Lincoln streets and First and Fourth Avenues and are connected by a system of pedestrian walkways. They are collectively called the “Portland Open Space Sequence.”
“Portland is well-known for the 1970s and 1980s transformation of its downtown with great public spaces like Waterfront Park and Pioneer Courthouse Square,” said Randy Gragg, president of the Halprin Landscape Conservancy, the initiators of the nomination. “But it was Halprin’s fountain plazas of the 1960s that first made downtown safe for fun.”
A winner of the Presidential Medal of the Arts and other honors, Halprin and members of his firm, Lawrence Halprin and Associates, designed the plazas from 1963-1970 as the heart of the city’s first urban renewal district, known as the South Auditorium District. Their unprecedented sculptural wedding of public space, water, and references to the natural landscape turned the plazas into instant people magnets, luring investment and laying the groundwork for Portland’s unique urban renewal policies for decades to come, according to the nomination’s proponents.
“Nearly forty-three years after the late architecture critic Ada Louise Huxtable declared that it ‘may be one of the most important urban spaces since the Renaissance’, this defining achievement in Halprin's extraordinary career has been deservedly recognized by inclusion in the National Register,” said Charles A. Birnbaum, president and founder of The Cultural Landscape Foundation in Washington, D.C
Halprin’s ideas about nature, movement and social interaction transformed the American urban landscape and influenced a generation of designers. Halprin designed important urban projects such as the Century 21 World’s Fair site in Seattle; Sproul Plaza at the University of California-Berkeley; Ghirardelli Square and Embarcadero Plaza in San Francisco; Nicollet Mall in Minneapolis; Heritage Park Plaza in Fort Worth, Texas; the Franklin D. Roosevelt Memorial in Washington, D.C.; and the Walter and Elise Haas Promenade in Jerusalem.
As these plazas approach 50 years of age, the Halprin Landscape Conservancy, nearby property owners and the City of Portland have initiated a public-private stewardship program that has already resulted in tree-thinning, new lighting, and repairs to the iconic shelter designed by Halprin associate Charles Moore at Lovejoy Fountain. This spring, the conservancy will launch a plan for additional restoration and ongoing enhanced maintenance.
The National Register is maintained by the National Park Service under the authority of the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966. More information about the National Register and recent Oregon listings is online at www.oregonheritage.org (click on “National Register” at left of page).
Other information:
National Register nomination link
http://www.oregon.gov/oprd/HCD/NATREG/pages/nrhp_recent_nominations.aspx
Oral history of Halprin by The Cultural Landscape Foundation
http://tclf.org/oral-history/lawrence-halprin
Halprin Landscape Conservancy website link www.halprinlc.org
January 19, 2013
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in Urban Design
via Brian Bainnson, ASLA Trustee
You have a chance to help influence the selection of projects for the Transportation Enhancement/Oregon Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee grants. Take a moment to fill out the ODOT survey found at the link below. Comments will be accepted through 5:00 p.m., January 31, 2013.
More Information and ODOT Survey
November 8, 2012
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in Urban Design
via AIA/APA/ASLA Urban Design Panel
The City of Portland Bureau of Planning and Sustainability (BPS) is holding an open forum on Tuesday Nov 13 from 1:30pm to 3:30pm to discuss the "hot topic" of new apartment buildings within the city that include little or no off-street parking. The BPS has been hearing from a significant number of residents that they do not like on-street, overflow parking in front of their houses and question the four story, 45' height of buildings. The Urban Design Panel (UDP) provided feedback to BPS supporting the existing policies on the grounds of their support for transit, neighborhood services, carbon reduction, housing diversity, etc. and suggested that now is the period of "assimilation/adjustment" as residents get used to what these policies really look like and how they perform. BPS are asking that design community attend and add their voices to the conversation.
When: Tuesday Nov 13 from 1:30pm to 3:30pm
Where: 1900 SW 4th Avenue, Room 2500A
BPS Meeting Notice
April 15, 2012
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in Urban Design
Summer 2012 Emerging Professionals (EP) 101 Series:
Local Innovation in Greenroofs: Wildlife, Plants and Technology
A Green Roof Tour and Roundtable Discussion
6:00-8:30pm
June 13*, 2012 (tentative as we confirm roof tour availability, check back for updates!)
$20 non-member / $15 members / $10 students and emerging professionals
PDH's available!
Hosted by the ASLA EP Committee and Columbia Green this summer's EP 101 Series Event offers a guided green roof tour, showcasing three of Portland’s most noteworthy ecoroofs, followed by a roundtable discussion touching on wildlife, plants and technology. Space is limited to 25 attendees so RSVP today! Attendees will be eligible to receive PDH credits. All are encouraged and welcomed to attend!
Tour stops may include: The Indigo + Multnomah County Library + Ecotrust Building + Ladd Tower
A Portion of this event is a walking tour – bring appropriate footwear and keep an eye on the forecast!
*Note: Date has been changed from June 14 to June 13!
Register as an Emerging Professional (link coming soon)
RSVP Today! (link coming soon)
DONATE $150 to support this event as an EP Continuing ED Sponsor
Contact Christopher Olin for more information
December 15, 2011
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in Urban Design
Urban Forest Innovative Solutions (UFIS) is pleased to announce the 2012 Soils and Urban Tree Conference, to be hosted at the University of British Columbia (UBC) Faculty of Forestry in Vancouver on May 3rd and 4th, 2012.
Sponsored by Tree Canada, the conference brings together five leading soil experts for two days of lectures and field studies to present the latest concepts relating to ideal soil structure and biology. Attendees will learn how a new breed of arborists are growing healthy trees and preserving mature trees by literally looking at the roots of tree care.
Who should attend?
Arborists
Landscape architects
Urban foresters
Parks and public works personnel
Landscapers
Tree nursery personnel
Anyone interested in improving urban soils and tree health!
To download the complete brochure visit: http://www.ufis.ca/pdf/Soils-and-Urban-Trees-2012.pdf
To register visit: http://www.ufis.ca/soil2012.php
Speakers:
William Bryant Logan is an award-winning natural history writer and environmental columnist. He wrote the Cuttings column for the New York Times and helped launch Garden Design magazine. Bill has been a contributor to numerous magazines. His book on gardening tools won the Best Book of the Year award from the Garden Writers Association of America. In 1992, he founded Urban Arborists to care for trees in New York City. Three years later he published Dirt: The Ecstatic Skin of the Earth.
Paul Stamets has been a dedicated mycologist for over thirty years. Over this time, he has discovered and co-authored four new species of mushrooms and pioneered numerous techniques in the field of edible and medicinal mushroom cultivation. He has been named one of Utne Reader’s “50 Visionairies Who Are Changing the World” for his pioneering research and applied mycology. See Paul’s TED Talk at www.ted.com/speakers/paul_stamets.html
Olaf Ribeiro, B.S. (Agr.), M.S. (Plant Pathology), Ph.D. (Plant Pathology & Genetics). Olaf has over 30 years experience in diagnosing plant health problems in both the U.S and overseas. He has published over 50 scientific papers in refereed international journals as well as many popular articles on plant diseases and tree preservation. He is internationally recognized for saving historic and ancient trees by improving their health.
Peter Wild is the founder and CEO of Arborjet Inc., a manufacturer of tree injection systems and medicaments. Wild is also the president and owner of Boston Tree Preservation, an organic-based, proactive tree-care business founded in 1977. He was one of the first people to develop and use vermicomposting for fertilization and disease and insect pest management.
James Urban, FASLA, specializes in the design of tree plantings and soils in urban spaces. He has written and lectured extensively on the subject of urban tree planting and has been responsible for the introduction of numerous innovations, including many leading-edge standards relating to urban tree plantings across North America. His 2008 book Up By Roots: Healthy Trees and Soils in the Built Environment, has become one of the principal tree and soil references, and won the ASLA Honor Award in 2009.
Download Brochure
Register Now!
November 8, 2011
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in Urban Design
The Sustainable Cities Initiative and the UO Department of Landscape Architecture Present:
Designing The New Cities of China: Blending Ancient Traditions with 21st Century Sustainability
China is experiencing urbanization at a scale previously unseen in world history. Much of the new urban development is very international, rather than Chinese, in character. Dr. Jie Hu will discuss how the Tsinghua University Planning and Design Institute attempts to infuse projects with both 21st century ecological science and the spirit of Chinese culture and tradition. His ideas are illustrated in his prize-winning designs for Beijing's Olympic Forest Park (twice the size of New York City's Central Park), Tieling Fanhe New City Landscape planning and Tangshan Nanhu Eco-City Central Park. Click here for more information.
Portland Tuesday, November 8, 2011
5:30 pm Reception
6:00 pm Lecture
University of Oregon in Portland
White Stag Block, Event Room
70 NW Couch St.
Portland, OR 97209
Eugene Thursday, November 10, 2011
Noon-1:00 pm Brownbag Lunch
231 Lawrence Hall
University of Oregon
1190 Franklin Blvd.
Eugene, OR 97403
5:30 pm Lecture
110 Fenton Hall
University of Oregon
1021 E 13th Ave.
Eugene, OR 97403
JohnPaul Jone, FAIA
Jones & Jones Architects, Landscape Architects and Planners
Portland, Wednesday, November 9
5:30 pm Reception
6:00 pm Lecture
University of Oregon in Portland
White Stage Block
Portland Turnbull Center, #350
70 NW Couch St.
June 16, 2011
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in Urban Design
April 18, 2011
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in Urban Design
via Planetizen:
The excesses of the "landscape urbanism" aside, Michael Mehaffy believes landscape architects are well positioned to lead the way towards positive change in the urban landscape. Here's why.
Not long ago in this forum I offered a rather pointed critique of a movement in landscape architecture known as "Landscape Urbanism." The critique focused on several remarkable claims: the magical belief that the form of open space by itself can generate good-quality urban form; the parochial conceit that ecological landscape by itself constitutes ecological settlement; and most seriously, the spurious rationalization of "horizontality and sprawl" as allegedly eternal and unchangeable facts of settlement, which must be accommodated rather than transformed.
As I argued, this latter view ignores the evident historical facts, namely, that modern suburban expansion did not arise spontaneously from immutable economic forces, but resulted from comprehensible policy choices, rules and, especially, modern industrial design strategies. (As a seminal example I discussed Le Corbusier's highly influential scheme for suburban expansion, documented in the 1935 book Ville Radieuse.) Designers, complicit in this defective scheme, share a profound responsibility to correct their own mistakes. You broke it, you fix it.
And indeed, the lessons from a number of disciplines (economics, game theory et al.) show that such corrections are possible and, in the age of peak oil and climate change, urgently necessary. (This is all the more urgent in view of the rapid development of China, India and other countries, which are in grave danger of repeating many more of the same mistakes, with profound consequences for resources and emissions.) The time is at hand for effective reform, and there is little place for the same colossal mistakes to be rationalized in a self-indulgent poststructuralism by artist-designers.
But here I would like to offer a more positive view of the role of landscape architects in the important work ahead to get our house in order. After all, while architects have often been over-focused on object-buildings, it is landscape architects who have been the champions of the best figure-ground urbanism in the past – and they can be so again.
In particular, I suggest a number of key emerging topics where landscape architects are uniquely positioned to lead:
Click here to read the full article at Planetizen
January 28, 2011
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in Urban Design
An update on the work of the Sustainable Cities Initiative work in Salem, Oregon as this years focus of activity.
The Sustainable City Year concluded fall term work in December, with reviews and presentations by 275 students in fifteen classes across eight departments and programs. Members of Salem’s professional community (traffic engineers, planners, architects, and others) and interested citizens volunteered their time to provide students with feedback on:
• designs for a potential new police facility
• ideas for redesigning the city’s Civic Center offices
• engineering concepts to improve some areas of downtown’s traffic circulation
• north downtown redevelopment schemes
• design guidelines for the area south of Mission Street along Commercial
• methods to enhance connectivity between downtown parks and other community destinations
• a vision for Salem Housing Authority’s Orchard Village site within the context of the surrounding community
• cultural asset mapping in northeast Salem
• plans for enhanced civic engagement and internal staff communication
• recycling and reduction of food and biofuel processing waste
• downtown parking standards
• an interpretive trails plan for Minto Brown Island Park
In January, winter term work will include building designs for the North Downtown area, civic engagement strategies, architectural projects for the Orchard Village site and possible infill development opportunities at other SHA properties, redevelopment studies for specific sites in multiple urban renewal areas, and a sustainable streetlights project focused on developing a more efficient design for lighting and identifying alternative sources of revenue to fund Salem’s streetlights.
Read more about what's been happening in the Sustainable Cities Initiative here.
December 13, 2010
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The Fall Emerging Professionals Workshop & Happy Hour had a great turnout, with 24 attendees including: EP members, ASLA members and nonmembers and persons from other agencies including BES & PBOT. Many participants took advantage of the 1.5 PDH credits and recieved certificates were handed out at end of the tour.
Kandy Welch from Harry L. Stearns gave a demo at the beginning which outlined basic lighting principles and types, and there were several rounds of Q&A prior to leaving for the tour.
Tour:
The tour, stopped and viewed 7 built projects making use of all types of lighting. Kandy answered questions along the way and took foot-candle readings with a light meter.
- Suspended overheads
- Post-mounted floods
- In-grade and post/stake mounted uplights / accents
- Bollard lights
- Wall and Step lights
- Submersible lights
- Custom lighting applications
Happy Hour:
Over half of the group met at Bridgeport for the Happy hour, which was a great networking opportunity for the several EP’s in attendance. Also, several of the seasoned ASLA members called themselves “RE-emerging professionals†and explained they intend to participate in future events... so keep that in mind for future events.
Stay tuned for more Emerging Professionals events in the next year via the web or by joining the facebook page.
November 12, 2010
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in Urban Design
A benefit of membership in ASLA is one free membership to a Professional Practice Networks, in "17 specialized areas of landscape architecture... Membership in these groups is available exclusively to ASLA members, who may join one PPN for free, and each additional PPN for only $15 per year. Topics include a variety of specializations, including: from Campus Planning and Design, Healthcare and Therapeutic Design, Historic Preservation, Transportation, Parks and Recreation, Sustainable Design and Development and Women in Landscape Architecture, to name a few.
Our current Oregon Chapter President Jim Hencke is the national chair of the Urban Design PPN, which periodically releases newsletters of items of interest for members related to urban issue from around the globe. From the latest: "Welcome to our Fall 2010 ASLA Urban Design Professional Practice Network Newsletter! This issue contains articles on art intervention in participatory planning, an analysis of the Křemežsky Brook watershed, A “Kit of Parks†for vacant lots and other unused spaces, and the urban streetscapes of Taipei."
Images from 'Urban Transformations' by Sarah Kathleen Peck
Read the entire selection of Urban Design PPN articles