Contemporary Landscape Architecture Seminar

Out of the courses I have taken at the BAC, I appreciated the knowledge this seminar provided me the most. I am thankful to have learned about the historical movements that took place in the United States as it has expanded my understanding of socioeconomic change in this country. For the final projects I chose to focus on the effects of the expansion of the US highway system and the historical happenings of Portland, OR.

One event that stuck out to me was the removal of Harbor Drive and construction of the Tom McCall Waterfront Park. Due to the massive highway expansion of the 1950s, small Harbor Drive became a redundant expressway in the city, and was eventually destroyed and reinvented into a riverside park in the 1970s, bringing the people of Portland back to the waterfront. Portland has always been on the forefront of environmental change, being the first to encourage water bottle recycling programs, and for encouraging a massive amount of rain gardens and green roofs in the city, seen below and to the right.

image: https://chatterbox.typepad.com/ image: https://www.urbangreenbluegrids.com/ image: https://www.portland.gov image: https://www.biztrib.com/

The number of rain gardens in each neighborhood is represented by a number. The brown squares are green roofs.