Rediscovering The Basics Of Landscape Architecture

Rediscovering the basics of landscape

Between

1980

and

2000,

Ingrid Duchhart, a Dutch landscape architect, worked on

several landscape planning projects in Kenya, most notably the Green Towns project. Janneke van de Wetering, then a student of landscape architecture, visited the Green Towns in 2006, and observed the durability of many of the efforts undertaken a decade ago. According to both, to practise landscape architecture in Kenya is to rediscover the basics of the profession.

Learning from sustainable landscape

Photos: Ingrid Duchart and Janneke van de wetering

design in Kenya

Recently, newspapers reported

a catastrophic

decline in surface water levels in the \1au Forest area, northwest of the Kenyan capital i\'airobi, an important source of drinking water and irrigation. High-ranking

politicians, including the

President, are said to be the cause of this problem as they are giving out land in return for

Informal settlements

votes. Deforestation soon follows on these lands, and the capacity of the land to retain rainwater

places. Erosion and floods caused life-threatening

are often situated on unsuitable and vulnerable situations.

decreases. Here, in one news report, you have an interesting sketch of a major African country. lational politics and power struggles lead LO frequent unrest, while on a local scale communities need to adapt to ecological and landscape

Duchhart and others were ready LOset up the

they are gone LOO.Therefore,

dynamics, which, as shown by the above exam-

Green Towns project, a widely recognized

with genuinely motivated volunteers.

ple, arc dramatically

to improve livelihood conditions

Ingrid Duchhart,

linked. 'Nevertheless',

says

'people are working very hard

within and across communities.

''''orking on

structural imprO\'ements at a local level is certainly possible.'

lages by means of sustainable

effort

in many vil-

landscape plan-

we only worked

tion, it was very importantLO resentation,

[n addi-

find the right rep-

some district officials, the munici-

ning. Green Towns, which ran until 2000,

pality and ordinary citizens. [n Kenya there

received nationwide attention

exists no established

through telel'i-

framework for the kind of

sion and newspaper cO\·erage. ';\Iake your to\l'Il

integral landscape planning we do in Western

a Green Town' became a well-known slogan on

countries,

'Make your town a Green Town'

posters, buttons and bumper stickers. It has

melll, district departments,

Duchhart's long-time involvement

become a national organization

affected by what happens in the environment,

started in the nineteen-eighties some development

in Kenya

when she joined

projects financed by Dutch

development funding. Together with a colleague, Frederique

Grootenhuis,

Kenya and graduated earlier in Wageningen,

who lived in she was

able LOinvolve the university and apply for fund-

with a :\airobi-

unit, and has remained so

ever since, although

lack of funding has dis-

abled any overarching

as a landscape architect the i'ietherlands,

based coordination

activities in recent years.

'In many villages, however', adds Janneke

van

ects, some of which focused on landscape

projplan-

Ministry of Local Government.

and the

We brought

their knowledge and responsibilities

together.'

a training programme

for trainers to give work-

shops in participatory

environmental

Participation

was involved in several landscape planning

between

organization and the Green Towns vision hal'e remained alive.'

The key to the durability of the Green Town

From 1980 to 1990, she

there is for instance no cooperation the Ministry of Lands and Settlement

Duchhart

that Duchhart would use her experiences input for a dissertation.

and citizens are

de Wetering, who visited Kenya in 2006, 'the

ing to do more development projects. These later turned into case studies, as it became clear as

and, while different levels of govern-

and her colleague Grootenhuis

set up

planning.

These workshops, held in the villages, were

projects is participation. organizations,

designed LOhal'e villagers come up with all 'Unlike many other aid

we did not work with sitting

kinds of problems, such as pollution, erosion, drought et cetera. The concerns were grouped and the relations were identified.

'All of a sud-

allowances, which means paying locals to partici-

den, people began to see the bigger picture. We

ning, others on evaluation, landscape analysis et

pate', explains Duchhart.

were able LOdiscuss what measures they could

cetera. Using her experiences,

will have many people, but as soon as you leave

in 1992

'If you pay them, you

take in order LOmake an action plan and set up

Workshop participants

Real-life experience

in the Webuye PEP

solutions.

workshop prepare a presentation.

was crucial in apprehending

Here, trainees visit a small-scale

The purified water is used to irrigate vegetable

an action group. The action groups took up the responsibility Duchhan

adds, insistantly: 'All the time, it was

experiences

to present her

in Kenya to her colleagues in the

local knowledge and local people that did the

Netherlands.

job. It was not me, some lady from the ,,vest,

some kind of development

telling them what to do.'

could not possibly be related to landscape archi-

Many thought she was involved in aid mission, which

tecture. However, she learned valuable lessons

Functional aesthetics The importance Duchhan

with respect to participation

of aesthetics, according

to

and Van de vVetering, is minimal in

the context of Kenyan villages. 'As the challenge is to improve local livelihood conditions', Duchhart,

says

'we were forced to look at how the

landscape works, how to create a healthy environment

and, for instance, to look at tree plant-

ing in relation to watershed management. Essen tially, these are functional relations that we brought to the foreground.' She notes that in Western Europe, perhaps, there is an overemphasis on aesthetics, and Van de Wetering agrees: 'When it is only about aesthetic design, you are not sure anymore what you are contributing. In Kenya, one is able to experience the real c011lribution of landscape architecture.' Duchhart:

'Trees are beautiful but, foremost,

they give shade, produce fruit and preve11l erosion. Without the means to do maintenance

- as

is the case in Kenya - the aesthetics soon vanish. It needs a functional something

basis, it needs to yield

in the short term, otherwise it will

not be maintained.'

She adds: 'When I arrived

in Kenya, I really had to let go of the landscape architect's

urge to design. It was absolutely nec-

essary to let villagers do the designing themselves, and this comes down to the very func-

institutions,

and the role of

crucial for securing durable land-

scape planning

results. Thus, when discussing

this with colleagues in the Netherlands,

pond.

gardens and bananas.

When I arrived in Kenya, I rei

tional basics of landscape architecture.' It was not easy for Duchhart

for carrying out the plan.'

the problems but also in seeing

anaerobic sewage treatment

she was

had to let go of the landscap architect's urge to design

tort...•,

'0

told to say 'in my experience,

OC1~. ~

cr:JO <10

_

,

a workshop might

be a good idea for working on this problem', rather than 'in Kenya, we organized workshops to overcome this problem'. hard', Duchhart

'That was quite

remembers,

'however, things

are changing. In 2007, I presented

my work at

the IFLA Conference in Dubai, and met with a lot of enthusiasm to my great surprise.' Both functional aesthetics and participation become more important

have

in the Netherlands

and

other Western countries in recent years. 'We are now faced with a huge water challenge as a result of climate change. Landscape architects

~1

are working with the landscape again. How can we ensure that people are still able to live in

rJ

these lowlands when the sea level rises)' And all landscape planning,

especially on a regional

t""~

'j

scale, now has to be done cooperatively. As

JJ

Duchhart says: 'We cannot do without participation anymore. After a technocratic Dutch policy-making,

0

period in

policy documents

*

are now

more and more directed towards an inclusive and participative

(:)

planning process. In Kenya, we

were already doing this in the nineteennineties! '

The economic development

of Western coun-

tries in the twentieth century is now gradually

The first map that the participants the environment

would draw was the base map. This map represented

as perceived by them

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and going on field walks the participants

helped to further their understanding

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Drawing up a

becoming permeated

by an emphasis on suslain-

ability. According to Duchhart,

in Kenya, and

games are taking place at this level, develop-

A lot of things are lost, but

ment money does not always end up where it

people start over again, every

especially in the Green Town projecls, suslain-

should, but Duchhart fortunately

able and economic development

to stay focused on improving local conditions.

have always

been two sides of the same coin. 'We could only understand economics at the local level. A

'Nevertheless,

farmer is only prepared

contributing

to invest in planting

we were required

has been able

uphold their efforts

impact of our work. Were the projects really to economic development?

It

trees if he will profit in some way, for example

might, in the end, have been this economic

because the trees bear fruillhal

benchmark

can be sold in

time, and they work hard to

to prove the

that stopped some of the funding,

lhe market place. At this level, you are always

when the Dutch embassy judged our proposal

looking for suslainable solulions that are economically viable.' On a macro level, countries

for setting up Internet cafes to be economically unviable', she recalls. 'Still, we think the

are always compared

Internet

development

in lerms of economic

and per capila income. Big money

facility would have given an extra impe-

tus to our mission, because it would have

In 1988, the site of the busy regional market in Kisii was heavily eroded. The Green Towns Project organised workshop which resulted in an environmental of community

members, market salesmen

road and the upper watershed

development

plan and the improvement

and women, and the municipality

environmental

planning

took the lead in its implementation.

They first started to work on the

- and then improved the market itself.

The market was terraced with local materials as much as possible. situation; right: new situation).

a participatory

of the market. The Kisii Green Towns Action Group composed

This gave the market a unique character. As early as

2006,

the market had greatly improved (mid: c

Because of the firm terraces and the hygienic public toilets, the market became a success. The available

selling places and market incc

Towns has proven to be. Some projects

measures we took in Kenya, might help in the

ipating Green Towns as well as the access to

declined, but others even picked up after 2000.'

Mediterranean's

information. '

Duchhart

mate change.' And so it might be the case that

improved communications

among the 30 partic-

Durable It seems that what is durable, what endures, are socially and ecologically sustainable scape interventions

that are economically

from the local perspective.

land-

remembers

a project in Kisii, which

was on the verge of failure. 'But in the pictures

Europeans

taken in 2006 by Van de Wetering it looks wonderful. The tree nursery runs by itself, and it

nent in need of help - should be urged to look beyond the reports of catastrophe

protects the hill from erosion at the same time.'

brought to us by the media. Instead, if we look

viable

Despi te the difficul-

ties brought about by violence - to wit the 2007

Duchhart

Green Towns have learned from each other,

learn something

problems, and their consequences

Western landscape architects, academics and

according to Duchhart.

for the land-

'A lot of things are lost,

but people start over again, every time, and they

and disaster,

at positive examples, such as those described by

the organization

are very resilient

- who still regard Africa as the conti-

Exotic

and 2008 elections - climate change, corruption scape, the communities

battle against drought and cli-

has grown, and perhaps now

other professionals

and Van de Wetering, we may even and be inspired by the energy

of Kenya.

are starting to become inter-

Joren Jacobs works at the Nijmegen

experiences,

Research of Radboud University. His research focuses on

ested in Duchhart's need for participative

planning

paralleling

the

processes (what

planning

practice in marginal

Currently, he is working

Centre for Border

areas and border regions.

on a PhD study about cross-

work hard to uphold their efforts. The newspa-

could be called 'social sustainability')

and the

pers only show the downsides, but we should be

increasing importance

basis

more attentive to the positive signs.' She

(ecological sustainability)

believes that Green Towns has given communi-

in the landscape. For many, unfortunately,

received her doctoral degree through

ties new means to keep working on the environ-

Duchhart's

'Designing

ment. Indeed, in 2006 Van de Wetering wit-

irrelevant to Western contexts. One European

Theory: A Process of Reflective Learning from Case-study

nessed the resilience also of the Green Towns

region, however, would certainl)1 benefit from Kenyan insights, according to Duchhart: 'When

Janneke van de Wetering

vision: 'There were people who, despite losing everything else, kept on running Towns action group.' Although

the Green not all projects

of a functional

of our interventions

story remains African, exotic and

we visited the Mediterranean

coast, thirty years

ago, it was a different landscape. Now, it has

were successful, new Green Towns still emerged

completely degraded

after Duchhart left in 2000, and by 2006 there

development.

were about 41 of them. 'All in all', says Van de

involves, more than ever, looking at the mecha-

Wetering, 'I was surprised at how durable Green

nisms of the landscape. All kinds of small-scale

as a result of tourism

border spatial planning. Ingrid Duchhart Architecture

PhD is Assistant

at Wageningen

Sustainable

Professor of Landscape

University. In 2007, she her dissertation

Landscapes from Experience to

Projects in Kenya'.

office in Wageningen, scape architect Wageningen Movement

Msc works at a consultancy

BELW,after graduating

as a land-

in 2008. As part of her Master's at

University

she evaluated the Green Town

and visited most of the project sites.

This poses a huge challenge that

Shade is important

in this semi-arid town of Machakos. The trees provide shade for people and their goods. The

Machakos Green Towns Action Group takes joint responsibility

for the maintenance

of this beautiful market.