An architect is helping cougars cross the 101 Freeway safely

2021-07-07T13:05:00-04:00

Architect Robert Rock is facing a Herculean task: Design a bridge that will allow mountain lions to cross safely over a stretch of the 101 Freeway that roars with the traffic of 300,000 vehicles each day.

A pedestrian bridge for animals in the region has been proposed for several years. Advocates will now face an uphill climb to raise an additional $27 million for the projected $65 million price tag before August after previously securing $38 million thanks to a #SaveLACougars social media campaign from the National Wildlife Foundation.

Previously on Archinect: Los Angeles is building an urban wildlife crossing

The bridge is necessary to protect gene flow between two small populations of wild cougars that live between Simi Hills and the Santa Monica Mountains. With funding, the bridge could be installed in time for 2025. The LA Times has more on Rock's project here.

Obama's Presidential Center through the landscape architecture lens

2017-05-24T15:15:00-04:00

The most important question related to the Obama Presidential Center on Chicago’s South Side doesn’t have that much to do with its architecture. It is instead: What kind of landscape stewardship can a presidential museum and library offer? To be located in Calvert Vaux and Frederick Law Olmsted’s Jackson Park, the project already has a heap of canonical landscape history to contend with. So can the Obama library make a great park greater?

"So this new landscape has the potential to improve upon the already very good. But for whom?," Zach Mortice asks in his piece for Landscape Architecture Magazine. "Will these grounds remain public and accessible for all South Siders and Chicagoans, free of charge?"

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An architect is helping cougars cross the 101 Freeway safely

Obama's Presidential Center through the landscape architecture lens