Planning at the Landscape Scale

Paul Selman

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2006
• eBook ISBN: 9781134265893
• Topic: Architecture
• Subtopic: Architecture General

Traditionally, landscape planning has involved the designation and protection of exceptional countryside. However, whilst this still remains important, there is a growing recognition of the multi-functionality of rural areas, and the need to encourage sustainable use of the whole countryside rather than just its 'hotspots'.

With an inter-disciplinary assessment of the rural environment, this book draws on theories of landscape values, people-place relationships, sustainable development, and plan implementation. It focuses on the competing influences of globalization and localization, seeing the role of planning as the reconciliation of these conflicting demands, reinforcing character and distinctiveness without museum-izing rural areas.

Taking a 'landscape scale' approach to the topic, this book responds to the interest sparked by concern for rural landscapes and by recent local and national policy shifts in this area.

CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION:

THE CHALLENGE OF PLANNING AT THE LANSCAPE SCALE

Landscape needs little justification as a subject of importance in land use planning. For decades, in many countries, planning and cognate legislatures have sought to protect areas of exceptional scenic beauty. They have often also sought to safeguard locally important landscapes and to enhance the appearance of built development by retaining existing vegetation and creating new features.

Latterly, however, there has been a growing international awareness that landscape is far more than just another ‘sectoral’ interest. There has been recognition that the distinctiveness of places, regions and even countries relies heavily on landscape characteristics and that, ubiquitously and insidiously, powerful forces are eroding this. Further, we have become increasingly aware that landscape contributes centrally to people’s quality of life, and thus requires a more systematic and geographically comprehensive approach than simply preserving the prettiest areas for those fortunate enough to be able to gaze on them. Perhaps most importantly, modern theories of landscape represent it as a holistic entity within which natural and human processes merge, and where economic, social and ecological objectives can be balanced in the pursuit of sustainable development.

Equally, ideas about the nature and role of land use planning have been evolving, and two relatively recent trends are of particular interest to the current discussion. First, is the increasing prominence of sustainable development since the early 1990s, and the recognition of planning as a key vehicle for its delivery. This innovation has been multifaceted, and not solely about relationships between the environment and socio-economy. Thus, planning has been seen more strongly as an instrument for spatial justice and for listening to the voices of all stakeholders whose quality of life may be affected by development decisions. It has further sought to regain the initiative on matters of design and ‘place-making’, so that people might identify with and have pride in their localities. Its role in regeneration has become increasingly important within a context of urban renaissance, as declining industrial cities have endeavoured to reassert themselves as vibrant nodes within global networks of intelligence and culture.

Second, especially but not exclusively in a European context, land use planning has become centrally associated with new conceptions of spatiality, to the extent that ‘spatial planning’ has now become the term of preference. This term is still in the process of stabilising, and definitions vary. Broadly, it appears to comprise two key characteristics. On the one hand, it is seen to replace an old style of development planning – one which, often as a consequence of statutory remit, was excessively focused on controlling change in the built environment. Spatial planning, whilst embracing this well-established field of activity, aims more explicitly to integrate sectoral responsibilities in the pursuit of quality of life. Thus, spatial plans sit alongside other plans and coordinating mechanisms to mesh policies for land use, community, economy and environment. Although many such policies are ‘aspatial’ in their conception, an important part of spatial planning is to seek their integration within the context of localities and regions. On the other hand, in a post-industrial, network society, new spatialities are seen to be emerging, reflecting flows and complementarities. Although the two perspectives share a great deal of common ground, we might suggest that the former emphasises integration within ‘place’ while the latter sees this occurring across ‘space’.

The theory and practice of both landscape and spatial planning are thus in a state of flux from which new possibilities are evolving. Significantly, these new potentials are associated with the widely claimed capacity of landscape to afford a scalar basis for spatial intervention – in other words, a distinctive contribution of a landscape perspective is that of ‘scale’. Principally, this implies that landscapes, as reasonably clearly defined terrains, possess innate scalar properties, and thus divide the earth’s surface into spaces and linkages that have meaning for both human and natural systems.

This book makes a foray into the interface between landscape and planning in two respects. First, it considers emerging practices of stewarding the landscape itself. This is referred to as ‘landscape planning’, and may be thought of as planning for landscape units. Second, it explores the potential for landscape to provide an integrative framework for wider practices of spatial planning. This is recounted here as landscape scale planning, or planning through landscape units. We may thus argue that landscape furnishes a terrain in which ‘place’ and ‘space’ coincide. Regardless of their shape or extent, viable landscapes typically possess coherent qualities of ‘place-ness’ in their own right, as well as fitting within a wider physical and information network across space. They are specific nodes and vertices where culture, wildlife, environmental systems, social capital and economic activity are particularised. Yet, as well as displaying and deriving their distinctiveness from a measure of self-containment, they are also conduits for physical and information flows from and to adjacent areas.

‘Cultural’ landscapes, which are the focus of this book, are simultaneously ‘real’ (hosting physical and ecological systems) and ‘imaginary’ (recognised by people through their collage of images). Whilst, in its exploration of scale and functionality, this book draws inspiration from the domain of landscape ecology, it recognises that this has often been criticised for modelling people-less landscapes. Hence, there is an attempt to redress this skew, and to propose a transdisciplinary approach that is concerned equally with the human and the natural.

PLANNING FOR AND THROUGH LANDSCAPE

As just noted, this book seeks to contribute both to the specialism of ‘landscape planning’, and to the conception of landscape as a framework through which policy can be delivered and actions integrated. It proposes that the land surface can be understood in terms of coherent units within which lives unfold and environmental systems interact. The notion of ‘planning’ used in this book is a generic one, as many legislatures have defined development or land use planning in rather narrow terms, excluding many topics of interest to the landscape. Here, a broader view is taken, corresponding more closely to the European Landscape Convention’s (ELC) definition of planning as ‘forward-looking action to enhance, restore or create landscapes’ (Council of Europe, 2000). This definition is similar to the longstanding notion of ‘stewardship’, embracing anticipatory care aimed at securing the sustainable development of natural and cultural resources.

The practice of landscape planning has principally focused on ‘cultural’ landscapes, wherein the use of land reflects an amalgam of environmental possibilities (such as gradient, climate and soil fertility) and human endeavour. This has produced classic landscapes, which are acknowledged to be as important to heritage as are fine historic buildings and vernacular settlements. Noting that concern for such landscapes is now universal, and has broken away from its former obsession with the ‘Old World’, Phillips (1998) affirms a growing international awareness of the links between cultural diversity and natural diversity, and the vulnerability of both to outside processes. This is paralleled by a widespread reaction against ways in which the global economy and technological advance have created increasingly standardised and homogeneous environments. Thus, cultural landscapes are no longer being seen as a sectoral, elitist, ‘western’ topic, but rather as arenas for multifunctional planning across a wide range of environments.

In relation to planning for landscapes, a number of core issues have emerged over the years. A major objective has been to safeguard a top tier, deemed to be the finest representatives of their kind, and to designate these areas in ways that ensure a degree of safeguard against unacceptable change. Often, this has been based mainly on restrictive development planning policies, but increasingly there is an emphasis on positive land management and the creation of new ecological habitat and recreational opportunity. Beyond these most special areas, there has been an acknowledgement of the need to safeguard more local assets by supplementary designations, and even to reinforce the landscape character of all countryside. Within the urban fabric there has been a longstanding commitment to the preservation of some key functions and to the inclusion of designed landscape elements within the development process, but this is now maturing into more integrated measures for multifunctional green infrastructures.

These concerns of landscape planning, however, whilst hugely important in their own right, are now seen to represent only part of the story. The contention of this book is that the notion of ‘landscape scale’ should be mainstreamed into the practice of spatial planning. On the one hand, spatial planning is concerned with ‘place-making’, in the quest for distinctive and identifiable settings where synergies occur between community, economy and environment; on the other, it ‘mediates space’, through its focus on nested spatial units within dynamic networks, wherein participatory governance is supported by integrated datasets and transparent decision-making. It also requires the integration of different spheres of policy activity such as community, employment and biodiversity. Further, by emphasising the pursuit of liveable and sustainable environments, it is concerned less with inherited conceptions of ‘urban’ and ‘rural’, and more with the experiential and functional validity of places. Finally, it increasingly acknowledges a spatial dimension to ‘justice’, where the geographical distribution of desired resources may be uneven, but efforts are made to improve accessibility and availability to all. These trends can prove unsettling to the traditional pursuit of landscape planning, which has tended to be sectoral and elitist; yet they also offer exciting new possibilities for an integrative concept of ‘landscape scale’.

Current conceptions of spatiality often distinguish between a ‘territorial’ space, i.e. distinct and bounded units with relatively self-contained socioeconomies, and a ‘deterritorialised’ space of network relations, in which places are essentially understood as nodes within a globalised web. Whilst this book acknowledges this debate, the term ‘territory’ is used only sparingly. This is because the European Landscape Convention, which has been a major impetus to landscape scale planning, refers to ‘territory’ in a particular way – essentially as the land of a nation-state, over which a government has sovereign jurisdiction – whereas other discourses treat it more conceptually. Hence, the term ‘territory’ is only used here when particularly germane to a specific theme.

The term ‘landscape’ has multiple associations. Even within planning and design circles, it variously refers to aesthetic conceptions of sublime or polite scenery, ornamented urban environments, tracts of visually coherent land cover and land use, and areas associated with characteristic stories and customary laws. In Old World landscapes, the challenges are essentially those of finding new and self-sustaining means of retaining landscapes whose qualities are being undermined by functional obsolescence; in the ‘New World’, the challenge is often one of adjusting colonial mindsets to discover new ways (or rediscover old ways) of sustainable living in fragile and over-exploited terrains.

Despite these manifold notions there are surprisingly convergent views about the importance of landscape as an organising framework for analysis of and purposeful intervention in the process of land use change. Distinctive landscape patterns and processes appear to manifest themselves in both space and in time, and they offer a context for integrated, participatory planning. A key argument of this book is that, in order to steward and inhabit landscapes sustainably, we must work in tandem with their innate rhythms and patterns, and respond to them at an appropriate scale. Sometimes, this requires a technical jargon and a sophisticated framework for intervention; at other times, it resonates with intuitive feelings about landscapes as identifiable and distinctive loci, to which we may feel instinctive and emotional attachment.

THE CULTURAL LANDSCAPE

Landscape, as defined in the European Landscape Convention, can be understood as ‘an area, as perceived by people, whose character is the result of the action and interaction of natural and/or human factors’ (Council of Europe, 2000). This careful wording embraces a number of ideas: a landscape is a relatively bounded area or unit; its recognition depends on human perception, which often is spontaneous and intuitive in its identification with a coherent tract of land; and it results from a long legacy of actions and interactions. However, it contains one rather debatable yet intentional element – landscapes may derive from a combination of natural and human factors, but equally they can be purely socially or purely naturally produced, and in the latter case there need be no explicit cultural component. In the context of the current discussion, this book has only a passing interest in those landscapes which are ‘purely built’ or ‘purely natural’ in their origins – it is concerned with the intimate association of people and ‘nature’ in the production and reproduction of distinctive cultural spaces. However, the European Landscape Convention’s definition suits present purposes well for a number of reasons. First, it recognises the role of human construction and imagination in creating and interpreting units of the environment that nevertheless possess a functional as well as a visual coherence. Second, it assumes that a fundamental feature of landscape is its distinctive ‘character’, which has resulted from a complex pattern of actions and interactions, manifest in both historical legacy and contemporary dynamics. Third, it implies that distinctive places are frequently the outcome of a fortuitous combination of natural and human factors.

Much of our previous experience with landscape planning has been in relation to natural/pristine systems where the human imprint is very limited. Whilst there are lessons to be learnt from the preservation of such environments, our concern here is with ‘cultural’ landscapes. This is perhaps most helpfully and authoritatively expressed through IUCN’s¹ Category V, ‘protected landscapes/ seascapes’, defined as:

. . . areas of land, with coast and sea as appropriate, where the interaction of people and nature over time has produced an area of distinct character with significant aesthetic, ecological and/or cultural value, and often with high biological diversity.

(IUCN, 1994a)

As an accompaniment to this definition, the IUCN observe that ‘safeguarding the integrity of this traditional interaction is vital to the protection, maintenance and evolution of such an area’. Hence, the sustainable development of valued landscapes pivots upon the complex relationship between people and nature, and on well-modulated governance. However, whilst the IUCN may be concerned with outstanding landscapes, these principles have a more general significance, because sustainably managed protected areas can be seen as ‘greenprints’ upon which wise stewardship of land can more generally be based (MacEwen and MacEwen, 1987), and because all cultural landscapes deserve to have their qualities recognised, enhanced and stewarded.

This invites debate about where landscape begins and ends, and whether there is any longer a meaningful distinction between ‘urban’ and ‘rural’ in postindustrial countries. Whilst terms such as ‘rural’ and ‘countryside’ are used here where appropriate, this does not imply that landscape stops at the urban boundary, even if one could be identified. However, it is fair to say that the emphasis is not only on cultural landscapes, but particularly on (agri)cultural ones – the parenthesis here implying that farming has been a dominant force in landscape production, and that it is more broadly symbolic of the general modification of rural land by human activity. Indeed, many other terrains may appear agricultural, as they are maintained in a ‘quasi-grazed’ condition by practices such as mowing, burning or even recreational pressure. In other cases, forestry or nature conservation may be the dominant user of land. However, one of the main arguments of this book is that multifunctional landscapes are likely to replace the polarised ones induced by monofunctional policy objectives during the 20th century so that, for example, modern equivalents to wood pasture might replace blanket tree cover, and more diversified land uses be encouraged in wildlife priority areas.

Thus, although there is an almost inescapable and implicit bias to ‘rural’ areas in the ensuing discussion, this is principally to avoid straying into the very distinct scholarship domain that has developed around the ‘urban landscape’, and which is variously concerned with the design of the public and private realm, human behavioural patterns, and symbolic expressions of power and capital. In reality, the urban–rural divide is blurring in many countries, both physically and socially, and the ‘landscape scale’ can apply to the full spectrum of spatial contexts. In practice, this book focuses on landscapes that are less extensively modified by urbanisation; it addresses a spectrum from green spaces within cities, through the indeterminate landscape of the urban fringe, across intensively managed farms and forests, via more extensively managed land that still retains many pre-industrial features, to relatively wild landscapes that have either escaped ‘improvement’ or are reverting to ‘nature’ following economic and social marginalisation.

In respect of landscape, the term ‘cultural’ invites controversy, not least because all landscapes are cultural in some degree – not even Antarctica is exempt from human influence. However, in policy circles ‘cultural landscape’ has acquired a particular nuance, and refers to those areas whose extent people intuitively grasp and whose distinctive character derives from centuries of human activity. Some are distinguished by a character that is widely perceived as aesthetically satisfying and/or ecologically or geologically rare, and are consequently deemed worthy of some degree of protection. Some are relatively nondescript, but may nevertheless command a high level of personal attachment from their inhabitants. Some are generally agreed to be unattractive, usually as a result of industrial damage, and may require remedial treatment to re-create visual and functional coherence; yet even here, value judgements are risky, and the expert ‘gaze’ may overlook visible features and inscribed histories that are cherished by locals.

Cultural landscapes are ‘synoptic’ spaces where human and non-human elements are fused in a physical and social entity laden with individual and collective associations. In this regard, Phillips (2002) has referred to the cultural landscape as comprising:

• nature plus people;
• the past plus the present; and
• physical attributes (scenery, nature, historic heritage) plus associative (social and cultural) values.

Stewardship of the landscape must, therefore, be informed by an understanding of three interlocking facets (cf. Terkenli, 2001) – form (the visual), meaning (the cognitive) and function (biophysical processes and human uses). Piorr (2003) amplifies on this by suggesting the need to consider:

• structures or landscape form, such as natural physical, environmental land use and human-made features, often recognisable visually;
• functions associated with biophysical processes and human uses, such as environmental services and spaces for...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• List of Illustrations
• Chapter 1
• Chapter 2
• Chapter 3
• Chapter 4
• Chapter 5
• Chapter 6
• Chapter 7
• Chapter 8
• Notes
• References