In order to achieve SITES™ accreditation, a landscape intervention must (among a few other prerequisites) maximize the opportunities for beneficial site performance by conducting an accurate and detailed assessment of site conditions and exploring options for sustainable outcomes prior to design. Each project must map existing site conditions and resources, collect information about surrounding areas (including non-physical influences like policy), and explain how this information will influence the sustainable design. 

There are many ecosystem services that can be protected, restored, and enhanced, which we’ll explore in this and other essays. Today, we’ll focus on the vegetation life-cycle and the ways in which sustainable design can leverage the functionality of native and appropriate plants, which reduce irrigation and maintenance needs, increase habitat, and promote regional identity. By replacing lawn, hardscaping, and invasive populations with native plant communities, we create a landscape that’s as beautiful as it is functional.

For hundreds of years, industrial, agricultural, and urban development have degraded and disrupted natural systems, increased impervious surfaces, polluted watersheds, and emitted greenhouse gasses which have resulted in the climate crisis and its alarmingly destructive weather events we experience today. 

A raindrop hits the ground of a parking lot, slicks off with accelerating speed towards a gutter, collecting pollutants and litter along the way. It enters a series of concrete tubes and eventually to the ocean: never to pass through a plant’s roots or an animal’s lips all while toxifying everything downstream.