Daylighting to Improve the City and the Environment

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Daylighting to Improve the City and the Environment

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Streams and rivers can be central attractions of a city. They can be beautiful, vibrant public places where people can enjoy the company of others while also enjoying the peace and calm of nature. They can also provide peaceful and aesthetically pleasing transportation corridors for bicyclists, roller-bladers, skateboarders, pedestrians and others.

For these reasons, daylighting is becoming an increasingly popular tool among urban planners and landscape architects.

What is daylighting?

It is bringing a stream to light (from underground). Often, it is a stream that has been covered by former urban development.

Daylighting can have tremendous and varied benefits — ecological, economic, engineering, and social. One prime example of daylighting is in Seoul, South Korea where engineers recently transformed a freeway into a beautiful stream and public space.

Image Credit: Justin Adams

Seoul stream daylighted and turned into a beautiful public space

In 2003, Seoul completely demolished a downtown freeway in order to daylight an ancient stream. The city then re-used about 75% of the scrap metal from the demolition to rebuild the stream banks and also create a commercial corridor. The result is a public space masterpiece and major tourist attraction.

Seoul is not the only place that has successfully daylighted streams, of course. For more detail on daylighting in Kansas, Mississippi, California, New York, Virginia, Washington, and other places in the US, take a look at this great report on urban stream daylighting.

If you like this idea, go to your own city or county planning department and see if there are any plans or possibilities for daylighting in your area.

Posted on Mar 18, 2010

Tags:

California, city, daylighting, Design, engineering, Kansas, landscape architecture, Mississippi, New York, planning, public place, public space, river, rivers, Seoul, South Korea, stream, streams, urban, Virginia, Washington

About the Author

Zachary Shahan

Zach has in-depth experience in a range of fields connected with the environment and society. He has a B.A. in environmental studies and sociology (from New College of Florida, the Honors College of Florida) and a Master’s in city and regional planning (from UNC-Chapel Hill). Zachary has worked in natural foods stores (ranging from small co-op markets to corporate giant Whole Foods Market), in government positions (in city planning and environmental education), as an urban research consultant, as the Executive Director of a non-profit organization promoting sustainable development and clean transportation, and, for the past couple of years, as both a professional blogger and an English teacher in Poland. He currently lives in Wroclaw (Poland), but has also lived in Groningen (the Netherlands), Sarasota & Bradenton (Florida), Chapel Hill & Carrboro (North Carolina), Sunnyvale (California), Ithaca (New York), and Charlottesville (Virginia). He is the editor of Planetsave, and you can also find his written work on Cleantechnica, sustainablog, Eat.Drink.Better., Green Living Ideas, Blue Living Ideas, Earth & Industry, ecopolitology, lightngreen, or ZacharyShahan.com.

One Response to “Daylighting to Improve the City and the Environment”

Outdoor Lights

Mar 18, 2010

Nice picture! The lights diffusing from under the water creates a magnificent and peaceful, calming effect. A nice tourist attraction if I may add.