Urban wilderness

Urban wilderness

Where appreciation for the importance of biodiversity meets the New Urbanism movement, one can find the pursuit of the creation of urban wilderness. Key traits of urban wilderness that differentiate it from lawns and other ecologically questionable forms of plantings are:

# Biodiversity - a wide range of species, both of plants and animals
# Minimal maintenance required for viability - plants that can survive without frequent waterings, can withstand local pollution levels, and do not depend on infusions of fertilizers or other periodic soil amendments (see xeriscaping)
# Deep beds - deep soil allowing the creation of mature root growth, protection from drought and destructive temperature changes, and the development of a healthy colony of microorganisms, worms, and other beneficial small lifeforms
# Native species - considered use of local varieties rather than exotic species
# Unstructured aesthetic - plants allowed to grow as they wish, where they wish, with minimal space devoted to paved walkways, trimmed grass, or other artificial environments
# Tolerance of groundcover and thick undergrowth - healthy ecosystems depend on "messy" microenvironments like decaying logs, thick brush, and muddy ground.

Urban wilderness has been created by programs as varied as the New York City Parks Department's Green Streets program (which converts median strips and other microenvironments into planted areas) and small programs in such places as Davis, California and Portland, Oregon to reintroduce native species.

History

The nineteenth and twentieth centuries saw the creation of vast regions of concrete and asphalt, with minimal space set aside for living things beyond humans and their pets. Jacob Riis and other reformers fought for parks in urban areas, but the resulting parks, while a vast improvement, were formalized, rectilinear arrangements of artificially orderly lawns, bushes, and walkways.

While many societies had traditions of intense urban plantings, such as the famously lush rooftops of pre-conqistadore Mexico City, such traditions did not reemerge on a larger scale in the industialized world until the creation by Calvert Vaux and Frederick Law Olmsted and others of naturalistic urban parks. The rise of the City Beautiful Movement enhanced this trend as American, European, and other cities worked to bring natural settings back into urban areas.

In recent decades activists have sometimes seized the lead from architects, social planners, and horticulturalists as groups like squatters and Reclaim The Streets have engaged in guerrilla plantings, from work done in or on abandoned buildings to more symbolic acts like tearing holes in highway asphalt and then filling the holes with soil and flowers. These actions have been particularly effective in creating new planted zones in economically decimated areas like urban eastern Germany and Detroit, where abandoned buildings are occasionally reverting to forest. However, this trend can carry its own doom as beautified areas can work so well that they become targets for gentrification, with thirty foot (ten meter) trees grown over building foundations being torn down for yet more high density development.

ee also

*Hundertwasserhaus
*Green roof
*Living wall
*Urban forestry
*Urban ecology
*Urban agriculture


Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.

Игры ⚽ Поможем написать курсовую

Look at other dictionaries:

  • wilderness — 1. noun 1) the Siberian wilderness Syn: wilds, wastes, bush, bush country, bushland, inhospitable region; desert, backcountry, outback, great outdoors; informal boondocks, boonies 2) the urban wilderness Syn …   Thesaurus of popular words

  • Wilderness Emergency Medical Technician — Wilderness Emergency Medical Technician, or WEMT, is the second highest level of wilderness emergency medical training available in the USA (second to Wilderness Advanced Life Support (WALS)), or other courses for advanced providers such as AWLS …   Wikipedia

  • Urban Design Group (UDG) — offers architectural, interior, planning and urban design services to its worldwide clientele from studios in Atlanta, Georgia, and Dallas, Texas. UDG was founded in 1975 by John M. Novack, Jr., FAIA, after leaving his position as Design Director …   Wikipedia

  • Wilderness medicine — (also known as expedition medicine) is the practice of medicine where definitive care is more than one hour away, and often days to weeks away. The practice of wilderness medicine is defined by difficult patient access, limited equipment, and… …   Wikipedia

  • Urban Hymns — Studio album by The Verve Released 29 September 1997 Recorded 13 October 1 …   Wikipedia

  • Urban Hymns — Студийный альбом The Verve Дата выпуска 29 сентября 1997 года Записан 13 октября 1996  4 августа 1997, Olympic Studios, Лондон …   Википедия

  • WILDERNESS — or desert; (Heb. צִיָּה ,יְשִׁימוֹן ,מִדְבָּר). In most biblical passages midbar refers principally to an uninhabited, uncultivated land (e.g., Jer. 2:2; 22:6; Ps. 107:4, 33–36) but sometimes also denotes complete desolation (e.g., Num. 20:4–5;… …   Encyclopedia of Judaism

  • Urban Hymns — Studioalbum von The Verve Veröffentlichung 29. September 1997 Label Hut Recordings/Virgin …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • Wilderness chic — (Also know as Outdoor chic/fashion) is a current fashion fad that is centered around the look of hikers, climbers, and mountaineers. This fashion fad is particularly prominent in Japan and on college campuses across the United States. The fad… …   Wikipedia

  • Urban sprawl — Urban sprawl, also known as suburban sprawl, is the spreading of a city and its suburbs over rural land at the fringe of an urban area. [http://www.sprawlcity.org/hbis/wis.html What is Sprawl?] . SprawlCity.org . Retrieved on 2008 02 07.]… …   Wikipedia

Share the article and excerpts

Direct link
Do a right-click on the link above
and select “Copy Link”