1.00 PDH, LA CES/HSW
The Explore the Floor sessions at the ASLA Conference on Landscape Architecture offer attendees the opportunity to learn about new and improved techniques and how these improvements and services can help to create successful design projects. This guided walk on the EXPO floor will include the exhibitors: Berliner, Greenfields Outdoor Fitness, and SavATree.
Berliner
The presentation will be on the revitalization of physical risk, the adaptivity of inclusive design, and how this equates to the overall play value for a playground when integrated with rope-based play equipment.
Greenfields Outdoor Fitness
Outdoor Gyms: Designing for Maximum Inclusion
The evolution of outdoor fitness equipment from simple pull-up bars along trails into customizable, multigenerational, and highly inclusive community exercise centers has great potential to positively impact community health outcomes. Some of the demographics that stand to benefit the most from these gyms are seniors and users in wheelchairs, who face steeper challenges than other groups in their efforts to maintain healthy lifestyles. To effectively serve these demographics, key design principles must be followed. Some principles are mandatory and required by the ADA; others are not so obvious but play a large role in making a fitness area not just accessible but truly inclusive. Covering gym location, clearance requirements, unit selection and orientation, surfacing, and more, this session will explore ways to ensure that fitness areas are utilized to the greatest extent by those who need them most.
SavATree
SavATree Consulting Group and its partners the University of Vermont Spatial Analysis Lab and the Center for Urban Resilience at Loyola Marymount University were retained by the NGO TreePeople to perform a tree canopy assessment of Los Angeles City and County. Using 2016 data, we mashed up high resolution imagery and LiDAR with other data including CalEnviroScreen, census data, and NASA Landsat data to look at canopy distribution, heat island impacts, and vulnerable populations. We found that the urban areas of LA have sparse tree canopy, high mean and max surface temperatures, and the most vulnerable populations. Similar conditions exist in parts of LA County, but many of those areas have much smaller vulnerable populations. We recommend expansion of efforts to preserve and enhance tree canopy on public and private lands to mitigate adverse effects on vulnerable populations and more equitably distribute green amenities.