英·玛哈1920—2001

Ian L. McHarg (20 November 1920 – 5 March 2001) was a Scottish landscape architect and writer on regional planning using natural systems. McHarg was one of the most influential persons in the environmental movement who brought environmental concerns into broad public awareness and ecological planning methods into the mainstream of landscape architecture, city planning and public policy.

He was the founder of the department of landscape architecture at the University of Pennsylvania in the United States. His 1969 book Design with Nature pioneered the concept of ecological planning. It continues to be one of the most widely celebrated books on landscape architecture and land-use planning. In this book, he also set forth the basic concepts that were to develop later in geographic information systems.

Biography

Formative years

His father was a manager and later a salesman in the industrial city of Glasgow, Scotland. McHarg showed an early talent for drawing and was advised to consider a career in landscape architecture. His early experiences with the bifurcated landscapes of Scotland—the smoky industrial urbanism of Glasgow and the sublimity of the surrounding environs—had a profound influence on his later thinking.

It was not until after his term in the Parachute Regiment, serving in war-stricken Italy during World War II, however, that he was able to explore the field of urban landscape architecture. After working with the Royal Engineers during World War II, he travelled to America.

Environmentally-based master plans

Following the publication of Design with Nature, Wallace McHarg Roberts & Todd (WMRT) worked in major American cities – Minneapolis, Denver, Miami, New Orleans, and Washington (DC) – and created environmentally-based master plans for Amelia Island Plantation and Sanibel Islands in Florida.

McHarg is credited as pioneer of ecological planning, which was introduced into landscape architecture. He implemented methods to ensure that social and environmental KPIs are part of development decisions. These methods included spatial mapping.

Later career

In 1971 McHarg delivered a speech at the North American Wildlife and Natural Resources Conference in Portland, Oregon, called "Man: Planetary Disease".

Awards

McHarg was the recipient of numerous awards, including the Harvard Lifetime Achievement Award, the Pioneer Award from the American Institute of Certified Planners, and 15 medals, including the 1990 National Medal of Arts, the American Society of Landscape Architects Medal, and the Thomas Jefferson Foundation Medal in Architecture from the University of Virginia. In 1992, he received the Neutra Medal for Professional Excellence from the California State Polytechnic University, Pomona. In 2000, he received the Japan Prize in city planning, which is presented to scientists or researchers who have made a substantial contribution to the advancement of those fields.

McHarg also received an honorary doctorate from Heriot-Watt University in 1992.

Legacy

In 1980 McHarg left the firm he founded and the firm changed its name to Wallace Roberts & Todd (WRT).

In 1996, McHarg published his autobiography A Quest for Life. He was also instrumental in the founding of Earth Week, and participated on task forces on environmental issues for the Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, and Carter administrations

The Ian McHarg Medal, named after him, is awarded by the Earth and Space Science Informatics Division of the European Geosciences Union for research in information technology applied to Earth and space sciences.

McHarg died on 5 March 2001 at the age of eighty from pulmonary disease.

Ian L. McHarg Center for Urbanism and Ecology

In the summer of 2017, the University of Pennsylvania Stuart Weitzman School of Design launched a new, interdisciplinary research center in McHarg's honor. Anticipating the 50th publication anniversary of his text Design with Nature, the McHarg Center's public launch took place in June 2019 as a part of an event, exhibition, and book project known as "Design with Nature Now". Its mission is to build on The Weitzman School's position as a global leader in urban ecological design by bringing environmental and social scientists together with planners, designers, policy-makers, and communities to develop practical, innovative ways of improving the quality of life in the places most vulnerable to the effects of climate change.