ARTICLES Archives - Page 187 of 312

Economy of Motion

As is true of businesses coast to coast, we at WaterShapes are counting the days until the economy turns around. We do so confident that economic trends are cyclical and that good times have always replaced the bad. But this particular recession has been deeper and longer than most among us have ever witnessed, leaving many companies – including ours – to hunker down and make what we can out of thin stocks of available business. As has been suggested numerous times in the pages of our magazine, however, this is no time for rash

Change From Within

So much has been written and said about our current economic situation that it can get pretty depressing. One thing I hear and read over and over is that “Many people are just stuck, waiting and hoping for things to change.” I can’t help noticing that, for lots of people in government and major industries as well as in small businesses and sole proprietorships, this approach means doing the exact same things they were doing when their days were fat with opportunities. Personally, I think that’s crazy! I believe if I want my situation to change, good times or bad, I must change myself from within and can’t afford to wait for external forces to push me toward prosperity – especially not these days, when nobody really knows what’s

In 2008, the citizens of Boston were rewarded for nearly 50 years of tolerating urban blight when the raised highway that split their city was demolished and the Big Dig was completed. One of the side benefits this project, note landscape architects Lynn Wolff and John Copley, was creation of a string of parks linking the waterfront with historic downtown areas. Here, they discuss their firm’s involvement in developing these much-welcomed spaces.

Covering the Traces

Boston’s Big Dig was essentially a Big Fix. Officially known as the Central Artery Tunnel Project, it served to repair damage done to the heart of the city by the Interstate Highway program during the 1950s and ’60s. In Boston’s case, the federal government had stepped in and inserted a primary traffic artery through what had been a downtrodden area near the waterfront. Its intentions may have been good, but I-93 ran north to south and separated the city’s historic downtown area from its storied waterfront – a disastrous decision that did little more than create decades’ worth of traffic nightmares. Ultimately, it also required remediation on a scale seldom seen in the course of human history. Planning for the project began in 1982, initiating what would become

Refreshing the Supply

In January 2008, southern California’s Orange County Water District unveiled its Groundwater Replenishment System, a treatment and reuse facility dedicated to producing water to resupply the county’s beleaguered groundwater reserves. A year later, Eric Herman toured the facility, getting a behind-the-scenes look at a thought-provoking system that is setting new standards for water treatment, management and use. While I was preparing our “True Green” issue for publication last summer, a friend invited me to tour the Groundwater Replenishment System, an advanced, 70-million-gallon-per-day water-purification facility located in Fountain Valley, Calif. The invitation to visit this joint project of the Orange County Water District and the Orange County Sanitation District came through

Radiant History

On a recent trip to Spain, Paolo Benedetti and his family took a side-trip to Portugal and happened on some Roman ruins that opened his eyes to a whole new set of possibilities. Here, in a most unusual ‘Solutions’ piece, he describes his encounters with the technologies used to heat an ancient residential indoor swimming pool as well as a collections of pools that made up the public-bath system for a seaside outpost of the Roman Empire. As a pointed expression of the growing global concern over the earth’s changing climate, lots of my clients these days are asking me about alternative methods for heating their pools. It’s a reasonable concern, and I don’t think it will be going away anytime soon. Part of the problem in answering these questions is that neither I nor my clients want to go out on technological limbs and invest in leading-edge or green ideas that have yet to prove themselves. The rest of it probably has to do with the phenomenon of

Devising watershapes that appear as though nature made them, says Anthony Archer Wills, requires both careful planning and expert execution – especially when the project is on a grand scale, as is the case with the one covered here. In this, his second article on a huge pond/stream/waterfall complex, he details the painstaking process he pursued in building a system that is nearly 800 feet long and includes caves and other intricate custom details.

Earthbound Endeavors

Last month, we began our discussion of a large pond, stream and waterfall system for a historic upper Midwest estate found on the forested shore of a scenic lake. As related there, the project was to include three major ponds and a series of complex waterfall structures connected by streams rising close to the top of the gently sloping property. To sum up, the space we were working with measured approximately 300 feet wide and 800 feet long – a large section of a 35-acre estate marked by scores of mature trees that largely governed the watershapes’ configurations. Moreover, as there were no natural rock formations or outcroppings on site, we faced the need to

Bright Ideas

It has always bothered me: Why do we take devices that draw electrical current and install them in aquatic environments where humans get in the water? Even if precautions are taken, isn’t this risky business? To be sure, suppliers have come up with all sorts of measures designed to protect bathers from any potential hazard, and I have nothing but praise for the ingenuity they’ve displayed in surrounding their products with safeguards that minimize concern. But based on my own observations and experience, I must say that

Permeating Issues

I’ve taken up a fair amount of my column space in WaterShapes with discussions of the wise use of water, and for good reason: What could be more important to watershapers than knowing how to make the best possible use of the material that defines our profession? And what could be better than the fact that it’s possible to approach the subject in positive ways that bode well for the future? The common thread in all of this coverage – whether it’s about conservation, constructed wetlands or rainwater harvesting – is that, ultimately, our aim must be to

In Hot Water

It seems like ages ago, those glowing days when a spa – whether separate from or connected somehow to a swimming pool – stood on the absolute cutting edge of residential watershaping. These days, by contrast, systems designed to deliver hot water and hydrotherapy to our clients have become so familiar that they’re almost taken for granted. From what I’ve heard, it’s almost reached the point where discussions leading up to some of the best custom projects are treating spas as

Out of Sight

If you’re like most people, you probably don’t give much thought to where the water we drink originates. Our supplies of this precious commodity are so reliable, ample and safe that we mostly just go to the tap and use what we need. I was once that carefree, but no more. As I see it, ignorant bliss is actually inexcusable these days, not only because each of us needs a ready supply of potable water to survive and maintain the quality of our lives, but also because