Michael Laurie - An Introduction to Landscape Architecture

 Climate and Mircoclimate Extract

From skim reading an extract from this section of Laurie's book my eyes have been opened as to how the climate and microclimate has been effected as a result of architecture and the way in which humans have engineered the landscape. I found the extract really interesting and it inspired me to comment on it...

In the past, humans have designed housing and buildings to compliment the natural climate and landscape in order to create comfort. 

However, in the 21st century we no longer design infrastructure in the same way, we build for our convenience. For example, transport links are designed to save peoples' time, money and fuel, we no longer consider the natural landscape when designing, the landscape is made to fit around what we have designed. Take the majority of cities for example, we build huge skyscrapers for the convenience of them, to create more room for workers or residents because of our ever rising population density. This then creates microclimates within these dense city landscapes. 

Would the climate within our urban and rural areas have more continuity if our landscapes were designed in the same way they used to be?