It's a Pale Shadow of a Real, Functioning River

Hohmann, Heidi

It's a Pale Shadow of a Real, Functioning River

File

2004_Hohmann_PaleShadowReal.pdf (926.04 KB)

Date

2004-02-01

Authors

Hohmann, Heidi

Authors

Person

Hohmann, Heidi

Associate Professor

Organizational Units

Organizational Unit

Landscape Architecture

Landscape Architecture is an environmental design discipline. Landscape architects actively shape the human environment: they map, interpret, imagine, draw, build, conceptualize, synthesize, and project ideas that transform landscapes. The design process involves creative expression that derives from an understanding of the context of site (or landscape) ecosystems, cultural frameworks, functional systems, and social dynamics. Students in our program learn to change the world around them by re-imagining and re-shaping the landscape to enhance its aesthetic and functional dimensions, ecological health, cultural significance, and social relevance. The Department of Landscape Architecture was established as a department in the Division of Agriculture in 1929. In 1975, the department's name was changed to the Department of Landscape Architecture and Community Planning. In 1978, community planning was spun off from the department, and the Department of Landscape Architecture became part of the newly established College of Design. Dates of Existence: 1929–present

Department

Landscape Architecture

Abstract

If the River Returns Project were a new design, its greatest weakness-the artificiality of the water system - would be clear. Some critics would decry the ersatz river as a pale shadow of a real, functioning riverine system, while others would complain that the mechanized nature of the park should be revealed, rather than hidden under a thin veneer of "ecological design." As new design, the project would, critically, be dead in the water.