Archinect - News

The American Bird Conservancy and Yale University issue comprehensive study on the impact of bird-friendly architecture nationwide

2023-08-14T14:47:00-04:00

A comprehensive new study linking the implementation of bird-friendly glass technology to the improvement of wildlife safety has been released by the American Bird Conservancy, offering architects what they say is a first-of-its-kind primer on an issue that still lags in the design of buildings nationally despite its popular civic and environmental appeals.

The study was published in conjunction with the Law, Ethics and Animals Program (LEAP) at Yale University Law School. Yale had previously undertaken its own Bird-Friendly Building Initiative (the study’s commissioner) and now hopes to use its findings to promote a range of policy recommendations in addition to increasing awareness as to the benefits of using fritted glass, reducing the persistence of visually uninterrupted glass curtain walls, installing window screens, and cutting down light pollution, and other practical design changes.

New York City is used as one case study, leading a group of other American cities like Alexa...

World's longest elevated pedestrian loop at the Minnesota Zoo officially opens

2023-07-31T16:05:00-04:00

The Minnesota Zoo Treetop Trail, the world’s longest elevated pedestrian loop, is officially open to the public. The project, which saw 1.25 miles of a former monorail structure repurposed into a walkway, will take guests 32 feet above the ground and provide new views of and experiences with the zoo’s diverse wildlife, hardwood forest, and wetlands.

The scheme’s design was led by Minneapolis-based Snow Kreilich Architects, alongside engineering firm Buro Happold (known for its work on the High Line in New York City) and landscape architecture and urban design practice TEN x TEN. The construction leader was PCL. Together, the team was committed to minimizing disruptions to the zoo’s animals and guests before, during, and after construction.

“The Treetop Trail marks a new chapter for the Minnesota Zoo,” said John Frawley, the institution's director and foundation president. “As we look ahead to the Zoo’s next 45 years, the Treetop Trail is a major step in furthering connections to nat...

The 'healing nature' of Nelson Byrd Woltz Landscape Architects' new land bridge in Houston

2023-02-20T18:59:00-05:00

Named the Land Bridge and Prairie project, the new park was unveiled this weekend, when for the first time since the 1950s, visitors were able to cross over Memorial Drive and enjoy 1,500 acres of uninterrupted parkland at Memorial Park. Swelling like soft green mounds over a six-lane highway, the park is the latest example of how cities can mend the tears caused by disruptive roads without necessarily tearing them down.

Nelson Byrd Woltz Landscape Architects' Principal, Thomas Woltz, described his initial visit of the project’s site as a “post-nuclear landscape” when some 66 million trees suffered from a brutal drought in 2011. Since then, his firm has worked with city planners, archivists, and the Memorial Park Conservancy to consolidate the 20 disparate segments that had previously left the 1,500-acre park feeling “subdivided” to Houstonians.

Fast Company reports that "while the civic landscape was designed for people, the gently sloped nature of the mounds allows for small animals to cross over the highway as well (an underground stream allows for aquatic animals to pass under the highway, too.)"

With the addition of the land bridge, Houston joins Los Angeles County and San Francisco as communities aiming to adopt solutions for local wildlife to be able to move about freely. The total costs for the Land Bridge and Prairie project was funded by a $70 million donation from the local Kinder Foundat...

MASS Design Group 'catalyzes conservation and species protection' with The Ellen DeGeneres Campus of the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund

2022-06-15T13:52:00-04:00

MASS Design Group is celebrating the completion of the Ellen DeGeneres Campus of the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund in Rwanda.

Named in collaboration with comedian and television host Ellen DeGeneres, the 12-acre campus is located in the country's Musanze District and Kigali. The campus features three new facilities for education, research, and conservation. It is comprised of a selection of native landscaping and materials assembled by a team of over 2,400 local workers in a demonstration of the studio’s “Purpose Built” process developed by Principal Patricia Gruits and overseen by its new construction arm MASS.Build

"The campus will do more than inspire a generation of conservation activists in Rwanda, it will model new ways for global conservationists to bind ecosystems and communities in support of one another." - Michael Murphy, MASS Design Group Founding Principal and Exec. Dir. Image © Iwan Baan.

MASS Design says it worked with the foundation to design everything – from furnishings ...

LA's new 101 Freeway wildlife crossing to break ground on Earth Day

2022-04-21T14:49:00-04:00

The much-anticipated Wallis Annenberg Wildlife crossing will break ground on Friday, which is Earth Day. The bridge will ultimately be 210 feet long and 165 feet wide and will span all 10 lanes of the Ventura Freeway at Liberty Canyon in Agoura Hills. It is meant to promote biodiversity among Southern California mountain lions, which are isolated by the freeway, by connecting them with mountain lions in Northern California.

The groundbreaking ceremony of the much-anticipated, $90 million Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing project will be live-streamed on April 22 from 10 am Pacific Time at savelacougars.org.

Previously on Archinect:

An affluent California town is going to ridiculous lengths to get around affordable housing regulation

2022-02-04T18:00:00-05:00

The well-heeled Silicon Valley suburb of Woodside has come up with a novel way to block plans that would potentially bring in more affordable housing: Declare itself Cougar Town. Last week, officials in the enclave of 5,500 people announced that all of Woodside was exempt from a new state housing law that allows for duplex development on single-family home lots. The reason? The entire town is habitat for potentially endangered mountain lions.

The move is potentially foreshadowing of the ways in which local governments in California will, as predicted before Governor Gavin Newsome signed S.B. 9 into law in September, attempt to brush off the state’s efforts to mandate zoning that would engender an increase in multi-family residential units and affordable housing.

Critics say the pushback stems from the age-old notion of California living as an ever-expanding idyll of freeway-connected suburbs filled with single-family homes that has become outdated and regressive under the modern economy, pushing many to leave the state for greener pastures. The mountain lion population in Woodside constitutes in their eyes an egregious attempt to use wildlife as a shield in the town leadership’s preservation schemes.

“Don’t believe for a second that this is driven by mountain lion habitat concerns,” former town council member Daniel Yost told the LA Times. “It is not. It is resistance by some members of the Town Council to do our fair ...

LA's 101 Freeway wildlife crossing now has a groundbreaking set for spring

2022-01-20T11:37:00-05:00

A much-needed piece of infrastructure is about to start taking shape for wildlife in Los Angeles’ Santa Monica Mountains.

Curbed is reporting that construction for the Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing, which connects a stretch of protected land along California’s 101 freeway called Liberty Canyon will now officially begin this spring following an increase in the state’s funding for the project recently announced by Governor Gavin Newsom.

The bridge was originally announced in 2015 and has been amongst the most vocally-supported public works projects in Los Angeles in recent years. The county’s mountain lion population has been shown to be increasingly fragmented and diffuse since 2002 and will now be protected along with other groups of animals thanks to the new 210-foot crossing from architect Robert Rock.

Rock was selected by the joint National Wildlife Foundation-Caltrans development team to put an end to the high frequency of animal-related collisions that happen about 300,0...

Largest wildlife overpass in U.S. proposed for L.A.'s 101 Freeway, could ease area's roadkill problem

2015-09-03T18:28:00-04:00

Mountain lions, bobcats and other wildlife would have less chance of becoming roadkill if [California] adopts a plan to build a [165-foot-wide, 200-foot-long] landscaped bridge over the 101 Freeway in Agoura Hills...Urbanization has taken a toll on Southern California’s mountain lion population, spurring battles over shrinking territory and a depletion of genetic diversity because of inbreeding.

Related on Archinect: