Friday, August 17, 2007

Students’ Green Infrastructure Strategy Adopted as Policy by City of Charlottesville

The students in Lecturer Karen Firehock’s planning applications class Green Cities: Green Lands in Fall 2006 worked on several environmental planning projects in the city of Charlottesville. Students developed a green infrastructure strategy for the city and wrote the new comprehensive plan chapter on the environment in partnership with local firm E2 Inc.

On August 6th, City Council adopted the comprehensive plan as policy including all of the students’ suggested strategies. The plan guides the growth and development of the city for the next five years and beyond.

In previous versions of the comprehensive plan, the environment chapter mentioned only climate, soils and geology. This new chapter by the students includes strategies for green building and energy conservation, streams and stormwater, trails and connections, street trees and citywide tree canopy. Data were also digitized in GIS and given to the city.

This past spring, both the students and Firehock were named as Design Professionals of the Year by the City of Charlottesville.

In Fall 2008, students in the next session of the course will prepare strategies for preserving and improving the environment in Madison County, Virginia.

For more information, please see:

City of Charlottesville Comprehensive Plan 2007