Opportunities for design approaches in landscape planning

In the discipline of landscape architecture (LA) a divergence of the planning and the design cultures is not a new phenomenon. This divergence of planning and design may potentially expand the range of possible methodological and ethical approaches in LA. However, theory is lacking about the nature of these approaches and how to apply and merge them in planning situations. Thus the objective of this investigation was to better understand these cultures and the reasons for different approaches in order to identify possibilities for extending the methodological approach of landscape planning. The findings are based on an analysis of the theoretical and methodological literature of planning and design. The findings indicate that the distinction between the terms landscape architecture, design and planning are increasingly blurred. However, different contexts and tasks as well as the dominance of specific characteristics of values, methods and processes in the two cultures are obvious. Different tasks and application contexts apparently lead to different planning and design cultures. Nevertheless, within the planning context we can identify design opportunities that have the characteristics of a design situation. These design situations could be the starting point for using design approaches in planning more systematically. The expected added value of integrating design culture into planning may be improved communication and understanding of the fundamental planning objectives. Whether these expectations will be fulfilled must be pursued in future research. (C) 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.