Design Sustainability and Green Communities
Joseph Runco
ASLA and APA, Managing Principal of the SWA Group
How would you define in your own words ‘sustainability’?
Ideally, sustainability should be considered and justified at all scales:
global, continental, regional, local, site and building. In practice, one must
often ignore the larger setting and focus on the impacts and opportunities at
the project scale, since these are the opportunities most often presented to the
designer.
Sustainability is the integration of natural and human systems to produce
environments that meet immediate and long-term needs, with no degradation or
reduction of resources and opportunities for the future. Sustainability is first
and foremost about awareness; about understanding of the multiplicity of forces
and systems that must be balanced in a stable and regenerative way. Creating
sustainable environments requires consideration of multiple systems and finding
the right balance of environmental, social, economic and aesthetic needs. True
sustainability needs to look at the productive capabilities of every site and
project, rather than simply try to reduce impacts.
Should sustainability be controlled by government / global legislation or should
it rely solely on architects’ ethics and why?
The designer’s creativity or ethical stance alone is likely insufficient to
achieve the most sustainable project possible. The most creative and meaningful
project solutions often arise from a seemingly over-constrained problem.
To the degree that governmental legislation can set minimum requirements that
help “raise the bar”, such legislation can be helpful. Since project goals are
usually driven by clients’ needs (both public and private), it is useful to have
a benchmark of sustainable targets to start from. It is still up to the designer
to ‘push the envelope’ to provide the ideas that allow or convince a client to
achieve the best project possible.
Can sustainability be compatible with experimental / progressive / innovative
design and why?
Absolutely. In many ways, the focus on sustainability has introduced new
complexities, and opportunities to create innovative and adaptive projects. As
landscape architects, routinely involved with living systems, we have always had
a degree of training and appreciation for larger natural systems-with a focus on
physical, environmental issues. This training has often led to a degree of
complacency that is currently being challenged by architects, engineers, the
public and regulatory agencies. The current focus on sustainability that
addresses a much wider range of concerns is challenging and stimulating, and is
resulting in an explosion of experimental and innovative projects.
New technologies and understanding of systems addressing greenhouse gas
reduction, water quality and efficiency, project life-cycle considerations, new
materials, energy and food production and other approaches provide an
unbelievable range of opportunities for creative project expression. Perhaps
more important is the parallel consideration and integration of human values.
Creating environments that are uplifting, healthy, beautiful, challenging,
productive, economically viable and educational is as important as consideration
of more commonly understood environmental values.
Will you decline a commission if your clients declare that they are not
interested and they will not pay any additional cost to your sustainable design
and why?
There are many reasons to refuse a commission based on business considerations
or ethical concerns. Unless a project is inherently destructive from an
environmental or social standpoint, there is always opportunity for design
creativity and improvement of the project.
Budgetary limitations should be approached as a challenge to solve creatively.
Sustainable design is not necessarily more expensive than ‘conventional’ design
approaches. While some specific features may be more expensive in the short
term, they may in fact present cost savings to the client when project life
cycles and multiple objectives are considered.
All projects offer opportunities for creative problem solving, regardless of
budget. As designers, we have a responsibility to achieve safety,
sustainability, aesthetic and quality control goals on our projects, in addition
to meeting a client’s objectives.
It is astonishing that in the last five years or so, almost everybody claims to
be ‘sustainable’. Do you think that the world is really now so much more
sustainable and why?
The concept of sustainability has definitely become ‘popular’ in the mass
culture and the design profession. Everyone is on the ‘green’ bandwagon, and it
has become a requirement to reference one’s green credentials. Claims of
sustainability range from ‘greenwashing’ common products or packaging to
authentic and serious efforts addressing resource and social issues.
The constant attention to the subject by the media can result in a sort of
‘green fatigue’ and a pervading sense of deprivation, of giving up something and
that sustainability somehow means a change or lower quality of life.
As designers, however, the attention is positive. Sustainability provides an
expanded framework for great design. Awareness of multiple issues provides
opportunities for new ideas, for forward and positive thinking, the “dawning of
the next age”. I am heartened by the energy and ideas that architects, landscape
architects, engineers, contractors and clients are bringing to projects to
address sustainability concerns. It is a time of exploration and experimentation
that is invigorating.
Describe your ideal sustainable design.
My ideal sustainable design starts with a team of committed professionals and
client. Sustainability by definition requires understanding of multiple, complex
and interacting forces. Collaborative efforts between the very best design and
technical professionals are the most effective, challenging and engaging way to
design complex projects.
There is no single perfect project, as we work at all scales and land use types,
from dense urban environments, smaller cities and towns, to rural, agricultural
communities. The perfect project, at any scale, is regenerative and productive
in every way possible (food, energy, water capture and use, water and air
quality and use, materials use, carbon capture, healthy environments, etc.). It
is not good enough to simply reduce impacts, we must do better.
Our designed works should also be memorable and consider time as a key component
of design. Landscape architects typically consider and anticipate life cycles
and change in the living elements of our projects, and the same thinking needs
to extend to all elements of the projects, indoors and out. Landscape architects
have a unique role, bridging between the natural world and systems and the human
environment. With increasing pressures on natural systems and resources,
landscape architects are an important part of the teams designing our 21st
century sustainable world.
© Published by 2A Magazine, Issue 11