The Center for Urban Horticulture

Today my hat's off to Dave Fujino, Executive Director of The Center
For Urban Horticulture (CFUH) at UC Davis.

Their mission is to help develop more sustainable gardens, landscapes,
and public parks with timely horticultural information. They're doing
this with partners in academia, industry, and the public, with groups and
institutions like UC Cooperative Extension, Master Gardeners, the
College of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences at UCDavis,
California Department of Food and Agriculture, American Nursery and

If we begin to build new roads and repair old roads with pervious asphalt
or concrete, we will see astonishing results. If we
don't change, run-off from impervious roads will continue to
result in the loss of countless trees and the consequent destruction of
natural habitat.

When we build new roads, it's important to disturb site soils as
little as possible. If we do disturb the site, we have an
environmental responsibility to cover the soil with organic material
as quickly as possible. The more organic material like tree mulch or

Today I was running up Overlook Drive with my dog. I noticed signs of
erosion on both sides of the road and I started thinking about how
traditional road construction negatively affects ecosystems and
watershed protection.

When we build roads, we disturb soils. Disrupting soil biota
interaction allows invasive species to thrive. Invasive species
proliferation may ultimately result in poor water and air quality when
local healthy ecosystems are compromised.

We have to have roads! How can we construct roads that minimally

When we design a building or a garden, are we doing it for the approval of our clients or our peers or to gain recognition? Who among the enlightened green architects is primarily interested in designing FOR nature? We must establish and work to achieve the overriding principle of sustainable design. As professional designers, we can seek recognition and approval from those who hire us, but until we can protect the non-human world by learning its strategies for survival and its vulnerabilities, we are not practicing sustainable design nor are we acknowledging the significance of design that protects and cherishes natural systems.