Ecological Landscape Design and Planning

Jala Makhzoumi, Gloria Pungetti

• Publisher: Taylor & Francis
• Year: 2003
• eBook ISBN:
  9781135809218
• Topic: Architecture
• Subtopic: Sustainability in Architecture

Based on both research and practical experience,Ecological Landscape Design and Planning offers a holistic methodological approach to landscape design and planning. It focuses on the scarcity of natural resources in the Mediterranean and the need to aim for long-term ecological stability and environmental sustainability. The principles of this approach, therefore, can be used as a theoretical foundation for holistic landscape research, creative ecological design and better sustainable practice development.

Part One: Background

Chapter 1: Identifying landscape, ecology and landscape ecology

Before approaching the topic of landscape it is necessary to define landscape, ecology and landscape ecology. Any excursus on the concept of landscape, however, shows the plurality of meanings that the word embraces. This plurality is here examined and discussed with a view to a better understanding of the subject. The historical development of ecology also reveals fundamental changes in the discipline from its early beginnings and it is here discussed with emphasis on the linkage between ecology and landscape. This linkage is illustrated through the holistic and hierarchical approach of landscape ecology, which is central to the exploration of the humanised world of nature typical of the Mediterranean.

1.1 Etymology of the word ‘landscape’

The English word landscape is a borrowing of the Middle Dutch word lantscap, Modern Dutch landschap, which in turn derives from the common Germanic land and the suffix - schap meaning ‘constitution, condition’, while both the Old English landscipe and the Old High German lantscaf had the connotation of ‘region’, ‘tract’. Specifically, the Old High German lantscaf became in Modern German Landschaft; the Middle Dutch lantscap became in Modern Dutch landschap; the Old English landscipe became in the sixteenth century landskip; in the seventeenth century lantskip and now landscape.

In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the word in English meant ‘a picture representing natural inland scenery, as distinguished from a sea picture, portrait etc’. In the eighteenth century, its meaning was extended to ‘a piece of country scenery’, specifically ‘a view or prospect of natural inland scenery, such as can be taken in at a glance from one point of view’; and in the nineteenth century to ‘a tract of land with its distinguishing characteristics and features, especially considered as a product of modifying or shaping processes and agents’ (Onions, 1966; Simpson and Weiner, 1989).

In the last century, the generalised sense of the English word deriving from all this has been simply ‘inland natural scenery, or its representation in painting’. To add to this, the word is now used metaphorically too, for instance to express political or cultural states of affairs, e.g. ‘the landscape of international politics’ or ‘the intellectual landscape’. Landscape can also be broken up into two words: land+scape. From the end of the eighteenth century similar words have been formed in imitation of landscape, e.g. seascape with the meaning of ‘a picture or a picturesque view of the sea’, or cityscape, signifying ‘a view of, or the layout of a city’, namely city scenery.

1.2 Usage of the word ‘landscape’

All the above shows how landscape preserves a wide spectrum of meanings, ranging from a general perspective (e.g. countryside) to a distinct geographical definition (e.g. district, region, estates). It can also imply cultural and political situations. People indeed have used the word landscape in different ways, according to different points of view. Four major perspectives can be identified: landscape as scenery, as a specific place, as an expression of culture, and as a holistic entity.

Landscape as scenery is recorded in many geographical dictionaries (e.g. Clark, 1985; Stamp, 1966; Stamp and Clark, 1979), the term deriving from the Dutch expression illustrated before. The British tendency of the last century had confined the word mainly to the physical aspects, that is, implying natural scenery without human intervention. The definition by Hartshorne (1959, p. 168) of landscape as ‘the external visible surface of the earth’ implies, however, both objective interpretation, i.e. the description of the characteristics of an area and its view, and subjective interpretation, i.e. the total sum of certain features of an area. Goulty (1991, p. 158) has gone further, defining landscape as ‘a view of prospect of scenery, such as can be taken in at a glance from one point’. Physical and psychological perceptions, therefore, have been relevant in this usage of the word.

Landscape as a specific place is again a geographical question. The word Landschaft is really associated with the continental European school of Landschaftsgeographie, originating in Germany a century ago. The subject of ‘landscape science’, defined for the first time by this school (Johnston et al., 1986), concerned mainly physical and geographical aspects, such as the form of the landscape of specific regions. Landscape is thus seen here as a ‘geographical place’. The understanding of the physical processes of a site, in addition, can be connected to the appreciation of beauty (Ruskin, 1988). Beauty indeed has been largely discussed in philosophy and such discussion constitutes the basis of landscape aesthetics. Going beyond aesthetic interpretation, moreover, it is possible to consider the relationship between landscape, place, culture and society. Hence, landscape is not merely seen as an aesthetic feature, rather ‘it is the setting that both expresses and conditions cultural attitudes and activities’ (Relph, 1976, p. 122). This definition, outlining the ‘sense of place’ in landscape, implies also that significant modifications to landscape are not possible without major changes in social attitudes.

Landscape as an expression of culture is the next usage of the word to consider. Landscape, in fact, means also how people have modified their environment from the natural state to the man-made. On a regional scale, landscape can be defined as ‘an area made up of a distinct association of forms, both physical and cultural’ (Sauer, 1963, p. 32). Thus environment and area have recently replaced the word landscape for conveying the meaning of ‘place for people’. Landscape accordingly can be considered a ‘place which humans inhabit’ and organise as a system of functional forms and spaces. To this extent, Jackson (1986, p. 68) has argued that ‘landscape is not a natural feature of the environment, but a synthetic space, a manmade system functioning and evolving not according to natural laws, but to serve a community’.

To add to this, several authors (e.g. Clark, 1985; Wittow, 1984) have pointed out the distinction between natural and cultural landscape. Natural landscape signifies physical landscape, referring to the physical effects of land form, water, soil and vegetation, while cultural landscape denotes humanised landscape, including the modification made by man in agricultural land, settlements and infrastructures (Small and Witherick, 1986). An extension of this is the use of landscape as an area of the earth’s surface where both physical and cultural forms are taken into account (Clark, 1985). The word has also been used to describe the total sum of the aspects of an area (Goulty, 1991; Small and Witherick, 1986), both rural and urban, natural and man-made, cutting across the distinction between natural and cultural landscape (e.g. Wittow, 1984) and contemplating also economic components and land use.

These considerations have led to the concept of landscape as a holistic entity. This has been discussed by a group of authors (e.g. Naveh and Lieberman, 1990; Thomas, 1993; Troll, 1971) who have presented landscape as the integrated study of natural environment, comprehending all the ecological factors involved not only in natural science, but also in land use, urbanisation and society (cf. 1.7). Thomas, in particular, has observed that the notion of landscape seems to unite different disciplines, while their different aspects (e.g. scientific and ecological, social and cultural) tend to draw apart from each other and to define rather different research agendas. Clearly, the term ‘landscape’ relates ideas about the cultural significance of land to ways in which it is materially appropriated and used (Cosgrove, 1984). Hence, landscape is a concept which implies a certain way of seeing the land and, at the same time, can fit into the history of economic and social processes.

1.3 The geographical perspective of ‘landscape’

The subdivision of geography into physical and human is well known. Physical geography concerns the study of the character, processes and distribution of natural phenomena over the earth space, while human geography is concerned with the study of features which relate directly to people, and their activities or organisation over the earth space (Clark, 1985). Physical geography, in addition, has been understood as concerned with landscape and environment. The discipline is seen as a study of the visible surface of natural landscapes as they would appear to a traveller, or as they are linked with environmental modifications and their implication for human welfare (Goudie, 1991). This understanding in some measure bridges the gap between physical and human geography.

In the last century, physical geography was often a description of the earth, with the sea and the air, plus its inhabitants and their distribution (Somerville, 1848). In this respect, Guyot (1850) was already arguing that physical geography should be more than mere description. He considered that it should be the science of the general phenomena of the globe. As a result, at the beginning of this century the first generation of human geographers felt the need to change perspective; thus, they continued with more emphasis to explore the relationship between human activities and elements of physical geography (e.g. climate, land forms, soil and vegetation). This way of thinking had a strong influence on new developments within the discipline, as it had previously tended to ignore human and environmental influences except when they were a factor in geomorphologic and biogeographic change.

Within this context, studies on landscape have been divided in this century into two main lines: natural landscape, more related to physical geography, and cultural landscape, closer to human geography. The former was a characteristic of British geography, which preferred geomorphology as the physical basis of the subject (Johnston et al., 1986). The latter was promoted among others by the American school, particularly through Sauer’s programme for historical geography at Berkeley (Sauer, 1963).

However, since landscape is a product of both natural and humaninduced forces, the old division between physical and human geography is inappropriate. In the history of geographical thought, in fact, landscape has also come to be considered as the totality of natural and man-made environment on the earth’s surface, interacting with the global ecosystem and society at the same time (Helmfrid, 1980). Following this development moreover, in physical geography landscape is related to morphology, while in human geography landscape is mainly concerned with man-land relationships.

The morphological method, however, has been criticised by Cosgrove (1984, p. 16) as a ‘static, determinate object of scientific enquiry’. He has also argued that ‘while the scientific status of genetic morphology as method may be disputed, the rigorous exclusion of subjectivity in the interests of its scientific aims is not’. The limitations of morphological analysis lie in its tendency to operate only at a surface level of meaning; and symbolic and cultural meanings invested in landscape are here ignored. For this reason formal morphology remains unconvincing as an account of landscape. Consequently, it is necessary to examine both methods (i.e. morphological and cultural) within the context of the relationship between man and his environment.

1.4 Landscape as we see it

Three main factors can be identified in determining landscape: physical, biological and anthropic. Their interrelations are continuously composing the landscape in such a way that we can distinguish between a spatial and a temporal aspect of this composition. The spatial landscape variety consists in the present interrelation of these three factors in a certain place, while the temporal landscape variety is represented by their interrelation through time (Kerkstra et al., 1973).

This idea is the principal point of departure for our definition of landscape. Therefore, we see landscape as a ‘dynamic process developing on the visible earth surface, resulting from the interaction between abiotic, biotic and human factors which vary according to site and time’ (Pungetti, 1996a). This is what differentiates landscape from ecology: while ecology deals with environmental processes which are not necessarily visible, landscape is a visible result of these processes which are in continuous change and contribute to the character of the genius loci. Therefore, time and space are fundamentals to be considered in this framework, as it is the holistic approach to the subject which allows us to understand the complexity of landscape and its wholeness. This concept has been applied to the landscape planning process discussed in Part Two and to the landscape design paradigm illustrated in Part Three.

In countries of ancient tradition, the shaping of the land derives from both natural and human agency, and the product of this shaping is called ‘cultural landscape’. As noted by Selman (1994, p. 2), over time cultural landscapes have acquired distinctive values and qualities, and ‘their retention requires the maintenance of a complex balance of local conditions’. Cultural landscapes moreover are related not only to the natural sciences, but also to the socio-cultural sciences as an expression of the human impacts caused by land use (Langer, 1973). Therefore, cultural landscape has been here defined as ‘the product of the shaping of the land by both natural and anthropic impacts developed often over a very long period of time’ (Pungetti, 1996a).

Added to this there is the concept of ‘rural landscape’, namely areas that occur between wilderness and urbanised lands (Dower, 1994). These areas have been used for generations by people for their livelihood and are still rural. They differ from place to place, according to the impact of land on people and of people on land. As Rackham (1986, p. xiii) put it, ‘rural landscape, no less than Trafalgar Square, is merely the result of human design and ambition’. Actually, it is the relationship between people and land that is the distinguishing feature of this type of landscape. Consequently, rural landscape is defined here as ‘the shape of areas in between wild and urban, either seminatural or artificial, characterised by a persistent relationship between man and land’ (Pungetti, 1996a).

1.5: The dimensions of ecology

Since its inception in the late nineteenth century, ecology has undergone radical transformations: it has contributed to nature conservation, has provided the stimulus for the environmental movement and continues to progress as a scientific discipline. The ecological sciences, i.e. ecology and landscape ecology, have in the course of their historical development directly influenced the landscape and indirectly contributed to its understanding and appreciation (Makhzoumi, 1996b). Ecology is also seen as the modern science ‘that deals most directly with the ancient questions about human beings and nature’ (Botkin, 1990, p. 32). As such, like landscape, ecology has the potential to offer different interpretations and to act in a variety of ways depending on the perspective and purpose for which it is used.

Developments that preceded the emergence of ecology as a recognised science, together with events in the century that followed, have led to a view of ecology as demonstrating a ‘discursive elasticity that allows it to be used to structure the world in a number of ways’ (van Wyck, 1997, p. 11). Ecology therefore has come to acquire several dimensions (Haila and Levins, 1992). The first is ecology the science, implying the biological discipline as defined by Haeckel, its founder, including its development and maturity in the decades that followed. Ecology and landscape ecology provide a rational foundation for understanding natural processes and their interaction and can guide approaches to landscape and environmental development and management. In this way, ecological sciences are increasingly influencing professions that deal with the landscape, i.e. landscape architecture and landscape planning.

The second dimension is ecology the nature, implying nature as a material fact and a material basis for human existence as well as a constraint of human culture. Here ecological thought, especially through the early years of its development, was influenced by pre-scientific beliefs of nature, mainly nature the creature and nature the divine (Botkin, 1990). Whereas the former described the earth as a kind of fellow creature, the latter proposed a divinely conceived nature which was stable and perfectly ordered. With the development of Cartesian mechanics in the eighteenth century, a third, mechanistic view of nature evolved: that of nature the machine. These three concepts, individually and in combination, continue to pervade twentieth century ecological thinking. As an example, a combination of the divine and animistic views of nature together with awareness of global ecology led to a view of nature as the biosphere, e.g. Lovelock (1979) with the Gaia hypothesis.

Third, there is ecology the idea, embracing prescriptive views of human existence. Ecology has often been associated with modern man’s desire for moral reverence (van Wyck, 1997) and the search for a larger order in the modern world. The association, according to Orr (1992), is no accident but a reflection of the feeling that ‘religion’ and ‘ecology’ similarly imply relatedness. Deep ecology as initiated by Arne Naess (1973) and as expressed by his ecoso...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Foreword
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• Part One: Background
• Part Two: From landscape research to ecological landscape planning
• Part Three: The search for an ecological landscape design paradigm
• Part Four: Conclusions
• Bibliography
• Index