Something different

Purplemonkeydishwasher

Top 10 Shapers of the American Landscape

Here is the list of Top 10 Shapers that I am presenting in EDA listed in alphabetic order. For comparison purposes I have linked each one to its entry in Wikipedia, but these are not definitive descriptions. And the Top 10 Shapers tag at the end will find you a few other interesting links...

Daniel Burnham

Andrew Jackson Downing

Dwight D. Eisenhower

Herbert Hoover

Thomas Jefferson

William J. Levitt

Robert Moses

 

John Muir

Frederick Law Olmsted

Gifford Pinchot

Reserach in NJ

New Jersey has released a searchable online database called Research with New Jersey. While focused on STEM, it represents other areas at Rutgers, Rowan and other NJ schools. It helpfully allows visitors to browse by unit. For instance, you can see all of the work it includes for the Department of Landscape Architecture. As it gets updated a little more, it could become pretty useful for discovering potential advisors, collaborators and authors.

Deer me

Lots of Internety deer references. These links mostly go to generic searches, so I can't promise that they won't include gross, offensive or irrelevant links.

Lifehacker presents some tips to reduce the chance of car-deer conflicts.
The Wikipedia entry on deer is pretty extensive.
Google Scholar has about 129,000 results on white-tailed deer.
Vox news stories that somehow feature deer.
Library of Congress holdings online that include deer.
Deer videos on YouTube

Get the most

Frank Bruni recently published an essay on how to get the most out of college. It sounds like it is quickly becoming required reading, because it hits such important notes. Make sure, he explains, that  you learn skills that reach beyond your major:

Another of those skills, frequently overlooked, is storytelling. It’s different from communication: a next step. Every successful pitch for a new policy, new product or new company is essentially a story, with a shape and logic intended to stir its audience. So is every successful job interview. The best moment in a workplace meeting belongs to the colleague who tells the best story. So take a course in Greek mythology, British literature, political rhetoric or anything else that exposes you to the structure of narrative and the art of persuasion.

Of course, cartography is another form of storytelling. And some of our students enrich other experiences with that skill, too.

Deer problems

Deer numbers in NJ are substantially than what is considered appropriate. What are the problems with so many deer?

• Disease Vector (ACSH)
• Lyme disease (NJ.com)
• A bigger threat to forests than climate change? (Nature Conservancy)
• Ecological impacts (TIEE)
• Hunger? (WIDNR) 
• No problem in NJ? (Medford Sun)
• No problem? (Thought Co)
• Poor management (PETA)

Deer NY Times...

Ronda Kaysen writes in the NY Times saying that "deer make the worst neighbors." ONe response included a more appreciative neighbor:

“They’re like these mystical creatures,” she said. “They’re like unicorns.”

But in the past the paper has suggested other responses including:
Counting 
Deer fences
Sterilization

The NY Times archives even includes a letter from Joyce Carol Oates about the deer hunt in Princeton.

Top 20 towns for deer-car conflicts

The Star-Ledger produced a list of the 20 NJ municipalities where deer get hit the most. Naturally, Somerset/Franklin made the list. Hillsborough leads the state with 316 "animal-loss claims" last year.

Local deer news

While gearing up for a fall studio focused on deer in Franklin Township, I have heard a few people dismiss the danger of car accidents involving deer. But the individual stories are compelling. Mark Rodgers' accident in Franklin was a fatal example of the dangers involved. A fatal accident in neighboring Montgomery Township got attention, too. They are a consistent problem, even down near the Shore. Sometimes the deer escapes and only the motorists are harmed.

And whenever a town tries to manage the local deer population, there is a voice of protest.
But the dissenting voices aren't always about whether this is humane.

NJ deer hunt harvest statistics

By different types of hunts.

A writing tip

Robert Caro says he always starts at the end of the book. He explained this to the New York Review of Books in a recent interview:

Before I start a book, I must know the last line. If I can’t, I can’t do the book. Once I have it, I’ll write toward that last line.
Do you have a closing line for the last volume of The Years of Lyndon Johnson?
Yes. Yes.

Turn up the heat and see what you get

When we were kids we learned to write invisibly with lemon juice and then later we could reveal the secret message by holding it close to a flame. The heat revealed what had been previously hidden.

This summer's British heat wave is doing the same thing. The heat is revealing long lost patterns beneath the surface. Sam Knight digs a little deeper in this New Yorker piece on the visible archaeology. 

Richard Haag

Richard Haag, one of the great landscape architects (and educators) of the 20th Century has passed. Maybe you could guess he was a Kentucky boy when the Seattle Times quotes him saying:

 “A big peeve of mine is the harsh divorce of children from natural processes,” he says. “We’re beginning to see a revolt against paved schoolyards. Put in a bog instead! Kids want to play in the mud. Every child should have a chance to explore, dig, grow food, find refuge in nature.”

If you don't know his work, TCLF has an impressive memorial online.

Two of his best known works were Bloedel Reserve and Gas Works Park:

Maps as keys

Once again, a major news outlet (NY Times) is trying to use maps as the key to unlock the mysteries of the electorate. Well, really it is Colin Woodward whose new book looks pretty interesting too. Maps are keys.

The light of Luis Barragán

Pritzer-winning architect Luis Barragán was a master of seemingly simple forms that manipulated space in beautifully subtle ways. Daily Dose of Architecture presents at a few fascinating examples of how he used color to shape the light that infused those spaces. Any excuse to look at photos of his work should be worth your click.

Deer damage

Whether or not you like their solution, this firm has some outstanding photos of deer damage to landscapes.

Deer-resistant plants

The Internet is filled with lists of plants that deer don't like. Two that stood out were the list from Almanac.com and the list of deer-resistant plants from Rutgers' NJAES.

Of course, there is a big difference between deer-repellent and deer-resistant.

White Canvas Bags for Safety

Researchers are investigating the possibility that white canvas bags could change deer behavior and save drivers' lives.

Domino Park

A new park has opened in Brooklyn, in the shadow (literally) of the Williamsburg Bridge. The new Domino Park is built on the remnants of the old Domino Sugar factory. The waterfront park has gantry cranes, steel beams, rusty walls, and syrup tanks that reference the site's past life. The NY Times recently reviewed the pretty amazing playground. The good folks at Untapped have taken a tour that reveals some interesting features.

If you can't visit in person, then this video might give you a taste.

Notes from DLA 2018 1

At the Digital Landscape Architecture meeting at Wienhenstephan-Triesdorf, Penn State's Kelleann Foster gave a great keynote lecture. As a good keynote does, it covered lots of ground, which I will not try to summarize. But along the way she referenced some other interesting resources:

Carlo Ratti's idea that designers (especially geodesigners) are 'mutagens'.

APA's Metrics for Healthy Planning Communities

Map.social

iNaturalist
Moves-App
HBR Issue on Design Thinking
Diana Budds' 7 urban design trends