A local park in any community is an important feature that encourages outdoor play, social gatherings, and healthy activities. But will your new park help regenerate the environment around it as well as the people who use it? The idea of regenerative landscape design goes beyond standard park features and even eco-friendly goals. How? Here are five ways.
1. Regenerative Landscapes Prioritize Sustainability. Sustainability is one key part of the regenerative design ethos. This is particularly important for parks, which can be high-maintenance, call for harsh chemicals, and need a lot of water. Sustainable system design, which seeks to avoid wasting the resources in the environment, is an important goal in helping parks regenerate rather than deteriorate.
2. Regenerative Landscapes Go Beyond Reduction. Regenerative ideas not only reduce water waste, such as through the use of native plants and better irrigation systems, but they also consider how the park's water can be funneled into other features — like a rain garden — and filtered before being returned to the drainage system. This approach goes beyond simple reduction to be proactive about the entire cycle.
3. Regenerative Landscapes Help Users Too. Sustainable designs focus on keeping the landscape healthier, but regenerative ideas also prioritize the users. The addition of a fenced dog park helps users — both human and canine — enjoy the park while protecting the rest of the park from overuse. And an interactive water feature encourages the park's smallest human users while also cooling off the hardscape and potential hot zones of the park around it.
4. Regenerative Landscapes Are Sturdy. The goal of any park is a long life of providing comfortable recreation for the community. So regenerative landscapes help build a sturdy and long-lasting system. This can be in contrast to high-maintenance sustainable systems that can be fragile. To help the park regenerate itself year after year, it may include hearty native plants, bushes that attract pollinators, perennial flowers and shrubs, and natural water catching systems.
5. Regenerative Landscapes Reduce Costs. The less outside help needed by park systems, the less it will cost the landowner to maintain. Replacing some inherently needy lawns with clover or other groundcovers, for example, reduces water usage but also weed control. Planting attractive clusters of native flowers instead of exotic ones helps protect the soil from damage. And evergreen trees provide year-round protective shade.
Could a regenerative landscape design help your park become a feature both the owner and users will enjoy for many years? If so, start learning more about this method by meeting with a landscape architecture service in your area today.
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