Protecting Parks From Climate Change

Smart designs and proactive planning can help mitigate the impact on the landscape

By Nikki Schlepp, Stacee Demmer, and Lydia Major

Climate change is transforming America’s parks. Warming temperatures increasingly affect plantings, wildlife, and even pest populations, requiring new maintenance regimes and management techniques. Severe weather dominates the news, resulting in flooding, erosion, and facility damage. Drought is widespread. Watering restrictions and fire bans are commonplace in many regions.

© Can Stock Photo / Elenathewise

What’s more, as temperatures rise, communities are increasingly dependent on their parks—stressing resources further: We crave the shade and recreational opportunities that parks offer. Human impacts are compounding the effects of climate change.

There are problems aplenty, to be sure. But there’s also a bright side: Thoughtful design—coupled with smart management and savvy investment—can protect park resources, and build the case for resiliency. Parks can serve as a showcase for sustainable practices, resource management, and community education related to climate change. Well-designed parks can play a vital and significant role in the world’s response to climate challenges.

How do you design a park that’s prepared to adapt? Consider these seven principles:

1. Preserve and plant more trees.

Carbon in the earth’s atmosphere is one of the chief sources of climate change. Elevated carbon levels act like a blanket, impacting the planet’s ability to “cool” itself, so reducing carbon in the atmosphere is key.

No organism or technology is better equipped to capture and store carbon than trees. Trees pull carbon dioxide from the air to create the sugars that form wood, branches, and roots, and trees sequester that carbon for an entire lifespan. Forests are excellent carbon sinks, but every tree makes a difference. Young trees take up carbon at a rapid rate, but mature trees can often hold decades-worth of carbon in sequestration.

The LHB design team focuses on maintaining tree cover during construction projects, and that emphasis pays off. Mandatory tree walks with city forestry staff, general contractors, and excavating/grading subcontractors are almost always successful in meeting the goals for minimal disturbance.

2. Anticipate stormwater impacts.

Climate change has made rain events less frequent and more concentrated. Storms become deluges that quickly overwhelm stormwater-collection systems built for less-severe rainfall scenarios.

Resilient park designs make accommodations. Hard surfaces like parking lots are minimized or interlaced with open spaces. Infiltration ponds are woven into the design, and because they’re populated with plants whose roots take up water when necessary, the ponds are still aesthetically pleasing when dry. (The roots also naturally filter contaminants.)

LHB has had success in mingling stormwater ponds and playground areas in ways that allow for proper drainage without reliance on removal via storm-sewer systems. We’ve also engineered designs that divert the stormwater into filtration tanks hidden under athletic fields, so the water can be used for irrigation later. And, in parks with streams that run through culverts, wetland areas have been restored to their natural state, so they can absorb and slow stormwater.

LHB Inc.

3. Create habitats for pollinators, birds, and wildlife.

It is true that birds and bees can’t restore the ozone layer. But they definitely prefer native plantings, and native plantings have multiple environmental benefits. Native plants are typically more resilient, able to withstand the flooding and temperature changes that accompany climate changes. The plants also need fewer inputs, like fertilizer, pesticides, and water, than traditional landscape and turf grass. Bee lawn, for example, requires less mowing and watering than does traditional turf, potentially reducing the need for gasoline and water, while having the added benefit of sustaining creatures that are critical to the food chain and the future.

4. Reuse and repurpose facilities.

Our clients never start projects without understanding the financial cost. But what about the environmental cost?

For a recent parks project, our design team factored in the carbon cost. We were asked to create additional space (twice as much) for a child-care program. One option was tearing down an existing facility and starting from scratch. But after conducting a study of the options (build new or create an addition), the team concluded that revitalizing the existing building stock, though several decades old, was more sustainable from an embodied carbon point of view. The community ultimately agreed, and the facility is now complete and successfully serving users—as well as the environment. 

5. Swap fossil fuels for electrification.

Burning fossil fuels results in greenhouse gas emissions, so if you can remove them from operations and move to electric (vehicles, mowers, leaf blowers), your park will be even greener than before. But don’t stop there: Consider ways to reduce energy consumption. Do the windows in your facilities open and allow fresh air to circulate, or is artificial cooling required? Can light bulbs be replaced with energy-efficient fixtures—or better yet, solar-powered units?

Also, consider adding electric-charging stations throughout the parks. As the popularity of electric vehicles (EVs) spreads, you’ll want to accommodate these visitors. Your facility might even be a demonstration site—one of the first EV-charging stations in the community.

LHB Inc.

6. Make your park a refuge from storms, heat, and other climate-related hardships.

Increasingly, government regulations require facilities like schools to include storm shelters, with such amenities as bathrooms and even backup generators. It’s easy to imagine a day when these same facilities may be used to harbor individuals displaced by hurricanes, floods, or even heatwaves. The more versatile and adaptable the facilities, the more likely they can be useful in circumstances brought on by climate-change volatility.

7. Educate park users about climate change.

Efforts to combat climate change cannot succeed without the backing of an educated public. Parks help people feel connected to the outdoors. Parks help people understand the fragility of nature and the value of conservation. Today’s parks can be a significant force in helping people understand the value of design and technology in slowing or even reversing climate change, and parks managers can take the lead in helping users make the connection between sustainable designs and their own futures. Put up a sign that says “See these raingardens? They conserve water.” Or encourage community groups to become involved in tree-planting activities that ultimately lead to carbon capture. The more you help parks visitors make the connection between their own activities and the planet’s future, the more likely we’ll succeed in stopping climate change.

Nikki Schlepp, Stacee Demmer, and Lydia Major were all part of the LHB Inc. design team that worked on recent park improvement projects in Brooklyn Park and Shoreview, MN. LHB is an award-winning Minnesota-based architecture, engineering, and planning firm that focuses on sustainable design.