Revealing campus nature: the lessons of the native landscape for campus heritage planning: campus landscapes should be restorative, giving back to the environment more than they consume.
Bruce, Jeffrey L.
As American settlement spread to the Midwest, college and
university campuses came to symbolize some of the greatest achievements
of public policy and private philanthropy. However, the expansion
westward often ignored the cultural precedents of Native Americans and
the diversity of the varied native landscapes. Today, campus planners
and historic preservation advocates can learn much from the
pre-settlement landscapes of prairies, streams, ridgelines, and wetlands
that Native Americans appreciated for their utility and beauty. Over the
last 30 years, my landscape architectural practice has touched on campus
landscapes in a variety of program areas, ranging from high-performance
sports fields to campus heritage master plans. Most recently, we were
involved with the Getty Foundation-funded campus heritage plan at the
University of Kansas (KU). Our office now works extensively with
"green" infrastructure tools because of their energy and water
conservation and climactic benefits.
Yet, for all the rapidly emerging knowledge about green
infrastructure, integrated water management (where water reuse is
optimized), and other green technologies, I've come to believe that
campus planning needs to go back to basics to achieve more than just
sustainability. Campus landscapes should be restorative, giving back
more to the environment than they consume. As a landscape architect, I
believe every campus should study, explore, celebrate, and teach about
the native landscape and the ecological systems of its site and region,
with a focus on incorporating natural systems into the campus
infrastructure. This ecological grounding is as much a part of campus
heritage as the designed landscape of quads, drives, and plantings.
Understanding Where You Are
In the profession of landscape architecture, there is currently
considerable debate regarding the definition of "native
landscape," which makes it an elusive concept to achieve in our
projects. Does the native landscape represent the landscape of pre-human
contact, before native cultures burned it to improve hunting or engaged
in rudimentary agricultural practices? Certainly, post-European
settlement introduced many invasive plants and animals that continue to
plague our natural systems as the human manipulation of the natural
environment accelerates.
Rather than attempt to pinpoint a moment in time that defines
native ecology, I prefer to frame the discussion around a concept of
ecological systems in which energy, water, nutrients, and biological
diversity are balanced and healthy. Such a condition has happened at
many different times in history, including today.
This function-based definition implies that systems are
self-healing and self-regulating with minimal human intervention. In
today's highly altered environment, this definition leads to a
practical approach for establishing realistic goals for campus
landscapes that complements the stewardship of designed and historic
buildings and sites.
It is well understood in higher education that the quality of the
campus environment is an important factor in recruiting students. Every
location on earth is a truly unique combination of climate, geology,
flora, and fauna. These natural systems can be a foundation that a
college or university can promote as part of its "sense of
place"--its unique qualities and seasonal atmospherics that are
unlike those of any other place. Generally speaking,
campus building expansion, parking, sports facilities, and other
needs have subordinated nature, eventually cloaking an
institution's rich ecological heritage. Yet, the cultural
landscapes of campuses often reflect their ecological origins. If one
digs deeply enough, most of the locations of built elements are in
reaction to the natural environment. Buildings were sited to prevent
damage from streams and waterways or, before the rise of air
conditioning, to accept summer breezes. Paths were located to easily
circumnavigate slopes or natural obstacles. The historic remnants of a
site's original ecology, such as rock outcrops, streams, and river
bluffs, are exceptionally relevant to campus heritage today.
Nature's remnants should not only be preserved for their beauty and
role in shaping campus history, but also managed and restored to
function as green campus infrastructure that mitigates the natural and
human impacts of stormwater, air pollution, and noise.
Learning from the Complexity of Nature
On many campuses, natural systems have become so disrupted or
altered that they no longer continue to function. Natural drainage
patterns have been erased and subjugated to placement in pipes below
ground. Productive soils that once supported native vegetation have been
removed, buried, or degraded. Rich plant ecosystems have been replaced
with monocultures of turf grass. All of these modernizing
"improvements" have removed the power of natural campus
landscape systems to function in a beneficial way. As the health of
campus landscapes has historically deteriorated with new buildings,
roads, and parking, the input of water and chemical treatments required
to maintain some acceptable level of function has increased
exponentially, along with threats of erosion from wind and water.
The message is that we cannot think about ecological and design
precedents separately. Full preservation of campus designed landscape
features such as historic hedges and lawns cannot easily occur without
bringing the energy flows of water back into balance through such
strategies as green roofs, integrated water management, and the
reduction of hard surfaces. In other words, green infrastructure
precedents and natural history balances can be powerful tools in the
stewardship of designed landscapes.
One way we can understand designed campus landscapes as integrated
systems of water, soils, vegetation, and topography is to peer back in
time to reveal that campus's nature. At KU, 19th-century campus
development occurred along the top of Hogback Ridge, later called Mount
Oread (see figure 1). This linear sharp hill fostered exceptional views
extending to the horizon (see figure 2), and, more importantly, it
determined drainage patterns and how surface water was to move on
campus. This ridge, visible for miles, was one of the first major
topographic landmarks for pioneers on the Oregon Trail after they
crossed the Wakarusa River Valley. With its spreading wing-like
hillsides, Mount Oread is the single most distinguishing feature of
KU's landscape.
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During the landscape master planning process, we looked at historic
campus photos to identify early landscape treatments that would reduce
maintenance requirements but not impact aesthetic qualities. We
discovered that the steep slopes surrounding the ridge were once
forested with a rich diversity of plants and trees. Restoration of those
plant communities not only returned a historic element to the campus,
but also mitigated stormwater, improved biodiversity, stabilized
erodible soils, and significantly reduced landscape maintenance costs.
At the University of Iowa (UIowa), the single most distinguishing
landscape feature is the Iowa River, which bisects the campus. Once
again, topography directly shaped early campus development. This melding
of natural and human history created a strong framework for the campus
urban forest plan that our office developed for the university. We were
able to identify the seven original natural plant communities associated
with slope, aspect, and elevation as a defining organizational approach
for management today. Although the natural plant associations no longer
existed on campus, they could be restored. This created a distinctive
district banding of visual interest as one ascends from the vegetation
of the river floodplain up the hillside to the oak hickory savanna of
the Pentacrest, the campus's historic core (see figures 3 and 4).
The return to native plant communities not only provides a visual order
based on sound ecological principles, but also hearkens a return to a
campus forest that is healthier, more biodiverse, less susceptible to
disease, and, as long ago, less needful of maintenance inputs.
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Stewarding Regional Character on Campus
Pre-settlement ecology is a guide to understanding the
opportunities that exist on every campus, but the key to managing legacy
campus forests is water. To rebuild the ecological function of campus
woodlands, we must also restore the original water and energy balance
that determined original species communities. Natural site hydrology is,
in essence, energy that is in equilibrium over long periods of time. As
development occurs, vegetation is removed, soil is compacted, and roofs
and parking lots eventually cover land surfaces. All of these forces add
the energy of more water flowing into the site hydrology, thereby
creating imbalances. Such imbalances lead to soil and stream bank
erosion, changes in plant populations, and a reduction in the
groundwater that nourishes the forest canopy. By understanding the
natural history of water on a campus, we can use new green
infrastructure tools such as pervious pavements, green roofs, and
bioswales to intercept or reduce development-driven energy impacts. By
helping original natural features to remain stable and functional, we
can restore natural cycles as sustainable campus assets.
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Our work at Baker University in Baldwin City, Kansas, offers a rare
example of finding a historic stream course in the center of campus that
somehow escaped channelization by engineers for over 150 years. The
drainage course, although neglected, deteriorated, and somewhat of an
eyesore, was still functioning. Instead of piping this natural artifact,
we celebrated its existence, using it as the main feature of the central
campus redevelopment by better defining its edges and recreating a small
lake that was removed in the 1870s (see figure 5). By preserving and
re-creating this historic water system, we were able to strengthen
pedestrian circulation, improve the campus's stormwater capacity
and quality, and develop a historically significant signature campus
feature. As a professional, I am amazed at how rarely such defining
natural assets are utilized or considered in campus plans. Working with
original ecology provides a great opportunity to preserve the past and
celebrate an institution's origins.
Sustainability and Historic Landscape Preservation Work Together
Whether native or highly designed, the single most
character-defining feature of most campuses is the landscape. While the
connection between campus landscape and natural ecology is undeniable,
its importance to the experience of generations, both past and future,
is more subtle. Planning and preservation "treatments" demand
sensitivity and extraordinary care in balancing the needs of historic
preservation, ecology, and the demands of a functioning institution.
Historic campus landscapes are usually a complex overlay of many
functions both natural and cultural, some of which appear on the surface
to be in conflict.
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These historic landscapes are cherished partially because they are
living environments. They grow, age, are damaged by changing water
tables, and are prone to species invasion and succession. Unlike
buildings, clear periods of significance are much harder to pin down.
Yet, we found at KU that landscape periods could be determined if we
identified the landscape architects who worked on campus, recognized the
species palettes available to them at the time, and knew how they
understood the ecological process.
Understanding Ecology and Historic Periods of Significance at the
University of Kansas
In most of the Getty Foundation-funded campus preservation studies,
investment priorities are geared to restoring or rehabilitating sites
(or "resources" in the preservationist's lingo) tied to
"periods of significance"--namely, the historic era or
multiple periods that the preservation planners deem significant. At KU,
we examined three major "high periods" of campus development
(see figure 6). These were defined by the university's remarkable
landscape history and included the work of noted landscape architect
George Kessler in defining the early campus arrangement of buildings and
features in 1900 (see figures 7 and 8); the rapid expansion of the
campus by Hare & Hare in 1928 (see figure 9); and the horticultural
legacy of campus landscape architect Alton Thomas in 1955 (see figure
10). Each of these planners responded in different ways to underlying
ecologies. Moreover, each of these periods are points in time when the
campus reached an apex of completion, moments when the visions and work
of a previous generation came to fruition before the advent of the next
wave of social and institutional change.
Looking at the campus through the lens of these high periods helped
us understand the contributions of campus leaders, architects, and
landscape architects from each distinct time. By examining the periods
from KU's founding in 1865 to 1900, from 1901 to 1928, and from
1929 to 1955, we were able to evaluate the relative intactness and
significance for preservation of vestiges from each chapter of campus
development.
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Just as historic preservation planners consider periods of historic
significance, at KU and at historic estates and parks our practice takes
a spatial approach to understanding how one designer, period of time, or
ecological microclimate may have shaped small pieces of larger sites.
For the KU campus heritage plan, we applied the term "spheres of
influence" to locate the greatest design concentrations from the
landscape architects who shaped the campus at three different times.
For each of these periods and planners, we developed appropriate
palette plantings at all scales along with suggested palettes for
building materials, sidewalks, walls, and paving. These palettes, in
tandem with guidelines for character-defining topography, spatial
patterns, and circulation, grounded a comprehensive approach to
preservation treatments tailored to preserve distinctive precinct
character. The result is a variegated collection of quads, drives, and
hillsides that tell different stories from different times in KU's
evolution over the last 150 years. For KU, our study provides a toolkit
of options for making daily decisions and guidelines for planning major
new building and infrastructure projects.
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Understanding the contributing elements of these periods of
significance allows us to determine when it is not appropriate to apply
native planting palettes on a historic campus site. In this way, we can
use native ecology and design history together to shape campus
precincts. At KU, native landscape ecologies were used to provide
contrast and define the boundaries of historic designed landscapes. For
landscape architects working with historic landscapes, the scale and
spatial sense of such outdoor campus rooms are as much a product of the
buildings that frame them as of the vegetation and site details.
To be effective in the 21st century, campus landscape preservation
must be integrated with architectural massing, the scale of roads, and
long-term stormwater management and utilities planning. We are trying to
bring expertise in both historic landscape preservation and ecological
understanding to our work. Thanks to the Getty Foundation's funding
of the campus heritage plan at KU, we were able to create a planning
model for integrating pre-settlement ecology, historic buildings,
utilities, infrastructure, and landscapes as a whole. In our practice,
the next frontier in preservation planning is to bring the basic
functions and evolved sustainability of native landscapes back into
historic designed areas without compromising the intentions of designers
from key campus periods.
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Jeffrey L. Bruce, FASLA, LEED, ASIC, GRP is owner of Jeffrey L.
Bruce & Company (JBC), a national landscape architectural firm.
Founded in 1986, JBC provides highly specialized technical support to
many of the nation's leading architectural and landscape
architectural firms on a wide variety of project profiles including
campus planning, engineered soils, green roof technologies, urban
agronomy, green infrastructure, performance sports turf, water
harvesting, and irrigation engineering.