18 June 2009 Lecture Guide No.

1 AR 143: Planning 1 Understanding Terms

Landscape Architecture is the art and science of designing the outdoor space for the biological and psychological well-being of man. It is an art and science founded on nature. art: As an art, landscape architecture is largely inspired by nature particularly the shapes, colors and textures of plants and rocks and even wildlife, the scale and magnificence of mountains, rivers and lakes, and the overall sensual delights provided by the fragrance of flowers and leaves; and by the sounds of songbirds, or rustling leaves, or whistling winds flowing though a forest. science: As a science, landscape architecture is founded on ecology and natural resources, supported by the science of engineering.

The practice of Landscape Architecture covers seven (7) basic components, namely: a. HARDSCAPING- or the design of hard horizontal landscape elements like pavements, both pedestrian and vehicular, as well as vertical structures, like seatwalls, gates and fences, pergolas and the like. b. SOFTSCAPING- or the provision of trees, shrubs, ground covers and lawns in the design. c. WATERSCAPING- or the design of reflecting ponds, fish ponds, lagoons, swimming pools, fountains, cascades. d. SITE FURNITURE- or the design and layout of furniture for comfort and rest, and furnishings such as public art, signages, and the like. e. LIGHTING- or the provision of lighting for general illumination, accentuation, security and mood lighting. f. DRAINAGE/UTILITIES- the provision of surface and sub surface facilities necessary to support development. These include water and sewer systems, drainage and underground wires.

g. IRRIGATION- the provision of facilities necessary to irrigate all planted areas.

Site planning: 1. involves the disposition of space for appropriate uses: the positioning of structures to provide effective relationship with the natural environment; the preservation of the natural advantage of the site and enhancement by landscaping; the provision of access to structures in an expeditious, attractive and safe manner; the design of the services, walks, streets, parking facilities, drainage and utilities. 2. involves the arranging of outdoor spaces to support human functions the process therefore requires cooperation among designers, owners/users and other design team members, the landscape architect. This may vary depending on the nature of project.

Below are distinctions among definitions however implying explicit links between site planning and its allied professions, which the reader should be aware of; taken from the book: Architecture and its Allied Disciplines

Landscape Architecture deals with the outdoors. Its inquiry covers concerns related to the outdoors that is immediately related to buildings, such as the front yard, or to the outdoors defined as the space between buildings, such as public plazas or neighborhood playgrounds, or even to the outdoors of a much larger entity such as a regional park. Landscape architects perform tasks at all these levels. Their discipline, therefore, is very closely related to the discipline of an architect, as well as to the disciplines of Urban Design, Urban Planning, and Regional Planning.

Urban Design is the discipline that concerns itself with the social scale of environmental design. It soles problems of putting buildings together in various arrangements so as to create a neighborhood or even a whole town. This is the discipline that creates public urban spaces, generally outdoors and I some occasions indoors, in which we spend much of our urban lives. Its product affects the daily visual experiences of the urban inhabitants and it is responsible for the pride or lack of it felt by a certain population for the neighborhood or town in which it lives.

Urban Planning is an environmental design discipline whose scale of concern is larger than that of Urban Design. It does not necessarily concern itself with physical dimensions, proportions, or scale in the urban space (this is the concern of Urban Design), but it is rather a quantitative and forecasting discipline. It plans for the future development of urban environments as wholes, incorporating the physical, social, economic, psychological, political, cultural and all other factors of all life and human concerns in urban areas.

Regional Planning deals with the same considerations as Urban Planning, but it does so within the total continuum to be encountered in a region, which is urban and rural and includes natural and human resources.