Green Industry ECOnomics - LandcareNetwork.org

the green industry. The initiative is also the distillation of old-world and
new-world knowledge about sustainable landscape design and construction,
and a great guideline if you quickly want to immerse yourself in the ideas of
sustainable landscaping.
The Initiative’s Guiding
Principles
• Do no harm.
• Use the precautionary principle.
• Design with nature and culture.
• Use a decision-making hierarchy
of preservation, restoration, and
regeneration.
• Provide regenerative systems as
The SSI guidelines provide an excellent
backdrop for sustainable landscape
design principles. They begin
with the preservation of special or
native soils, suggesting that “brownfields”
or “gray fields” (soils already
damaged through previous use) be
targeted for development, rather than
forests or other relatively untouched
ecosystems.
intergenerational equity.
While most landscape designs tend to
• Support a living process.
begin with client needs and preferences,
SSI suggests beginning with
• Use a system’s thinking approach.
• Use a collaborative and ethical existing conditions and an assess ment
approach.
of the surrounding eco system — a
• Maintain integrity in leadership pre-design site assessment if you will.
and research.
The next step (with client needs considered)
is designing with an inte-
• Instill a sense of stewardship.
grated design team that consists of all
professionals who will interact with the site before, during, and after construction.
This team will develop a project description, goals, and principles,
as well as identify all stakeholders to the project. Stakeholders are to be engaged
in the design process.
In the site design, controlling and/or
Potential Project Types eliminating invasive species is a requirement
in protecting and restoring
Parks, trails, campgrounds
site systems and processes. This is accompanied
by using appropriate native
Industrial and office parks
Government and medical complexes
and acclimated non-native plants in
Conservation easements
the design, along with preserving special
status trees; that is, trees that are
Botanical gardens
University campuses
unique to this environment and have
Residential sites
significant development.
Streetscapes and plazas
Reducing, minimizing, or eliminating
potable water usage in irrigation is highly stressed in the design phase. Preserving
or increasing plant “biomass,” plant density and layering, is highly
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