Page 39 - BusinessWest March 20, 2023

“When you look at city planning these days, the importance of sustainability and some of the environmental focus have shifted in just the time I’ve been here. There are so many sustainabil-
ity officers doing hazard-vulnerability plans for municipalities, doing climate- change vulnerability plans. I think cities are more attuned to that impact and how they should plan for it.”
Cities are particularly interested in alternative transportation, he noted, from bike lanes and enhanced train and bus service to creating more pedestrian access and walkable downtowns.
“The master planning for many cit- ies is to make them more walkable and use more public transportation
to make it more habitable. That’s an equity issue and a safety issue as well, because if you don’t own a car, or you can’t afford a car, and you need to take the bus and then walk to work or school, then you need a safe place to do that. There are a lot of federal
“You can have your lawn, which is nice and beautiful, but doesn’t have a lot of biodiversity associated with it, or you can replace it with something that’s native plants and trees, and you can increase the biodiversity associated with that.”
funds and state funds to help cities do that.”
Evolving Picture
Graduates of LARP work in a number of intriguing fields, some of them centered on climate resilience.
“That’s what I’m most involved
in,” Ryan said. “Green infrastructure is using natural systems to clean stormwater to provide climate-change adaptation to cool urban cities, to deal with water cleansing, that sort
of thing. That’s a big issue in a lot of our cities that have EPA declarations; we have to clean the water up in the city, to kind of capture stormwater and treat it — instead of a catchbasin, using natural systems like ponds and pools to collect it, allowing sediment to drain out and cleaning the water before it goes into natural water bodies.”
The John W. Olver Design Build- ing, which houses LARP (more on that later), is a good example, he explained. “There’s water that comes off our roof and adjacent parking lots, and then it’s treated in these rain gar- dens, these sort of swales around the building.”
Some cities are also making an
effort toward urban greening, he added, planting more trees along streets to cool the city and make it more aestheti- cally pleasing for pedestrians.
Another specialized focus for LARP students is preservation of cultural landscapes, such as cemeteries, his- toric homes, and state parks. Stu- dents have been able to work with the National Park Service, the National Forest Service, and state historical groups on such issues.
“As landscapes change, trees grow, things fall down outside, so can you
These are a few of the publications LARP students have produced recently as part of their real- world projects for cities and towns.
UMass
Continued on page 41
>>
Celebrating 35 Years in Business
Providing quality forklift services from West Springfield to all of Massachusetts
has been the cornerstone of our family-owned business since day one.
lifttruckmass.com 866-436-7967
BusinessWest
<< ARCHITECTURE & ENGINEERING >>
MARCH 20, 2023 39