Courses

All courses carry 3 credits unless otherwise specified.

Landscape Architecture

501 Studio I: Introductory Studio, Part One
Studio I and Studio II are a coordinated 14-week introduction to landscape design and the skills necessary to envision and explore design. Introduces students to reading and responding to the site. Goals include learning to experience and record the landscape, to design in response to the site, to think creatively, to generate design ideas and understand design as a process, to gain knowledge of design precedents and principles, and to learn tools and techniques of visual expression.

502 Studio II: Introductory Studio, Part Two
Continues Studio I.

503 Studio III: Garden Design
Studio III introduces the concepts and techniques of residential design at the scale of the garden. As students move to a real site and client, the garden is explored as a contemporary art through the design of an individual example. Precedent study and appropriate site analysis techniques are introduced as part of the design process.

504 Studio IV: The Public Realm
Introduction to landscape analysis, assessment, and planning with focus on ecological, cultural, and visual landscape issues. Landscape planning from regional to watershed to local levels. Emphasis on inventory skills, map reading, data organization, interpretation, and assessment. Broad introduction to design and planning process.

543 History of Architecture and Landscape I
A survey of the evolution of structures, settlements, and landscapes in the western world from the origins of human societies to the close of the Medieval period.

544 History of Architecture and Landscape II
Completes the survey begun in LandArch 543. Covers the Renaissance to the present.

547 Landscape Pattern and Process
Landscape patterns resulting from interactions of biotic, abiotic, and cultural resources and processes over time. Understanding these dynamics as a basis for planning and design interventions.

582 Landscape and Green Urbanism
Interdisciplinary seminar for upper level undergraduate and graduate students. Focus on the role of the built environment in urbanization and sustainability.

587 People and the Environment
Interdisciplinary seminar on the applications of environmental psychology research to planning and design.  Topics include landscape preference, territoriality and defensible space, way finding, and restorative settings/therapeutic gardens. Credit, 2-3.

591-3 Seminar
Topics vary by semester.

597 Special Topics
Offered periodically as needs and conditions permit.

605 Studio V: Site Planning for Housing
In Studio V, students develop an understanding of the legal context as well as the topographic and environmental contexts when site planning for housing. Students are introduced to fundamental site planning and site engineering criteria and technology and employ them in the design of a sustainable community. Precedents of community design are studied and ARC GIS is introduced for site analysis.

606 Studio VI: Cultural Landscape
The garden as the most personal, direct, and intimate expression of landscape architecture, as a contemporary art primarily through discussions of important works and design theory in the genre. Emphasis on developing an informed and creative personal approach which inspires while solving practical problems on real sites.

607 Studio VII: Urban Design I
Application of urban design theories as they apply to various scales of urban design, with special attention focused on civic scale design elements and organization of spatial and functional requirements.

608 Studio VIII: Urban Design II
Introduces students to the process of research, planning, design, and management of historically and culturally significant landscapes through selected real-world site projects.

609 Studio IX: Greenways
The overall goal of this Studio IX is to teach students how to plan and implement open space protection at a landscape scale. This will require the ability to synthesize information about natural features, cultural resources, and development patterns to create a greenway network that addresses the unique problems and opportunities of the study area.

610 Studio X: Interdisciplinary Studio
This studio is organized as a collaboration with the architecture department, and landscape and architecture students work together on a common site and program.

613 Construction I: Site Engineering
Site engineering problems related to general design including construction processes, alignment geometry, grading, drainage systems, earthwork, and detailing. Emphasis on construction document preparation.

614 Construction II: Site Structures
Design of site structures and required details focusing on stability, durability, and environmental compatibility. Emphasis on statics and strength of materials of site structures. Includes sizing of water retention and detention structures.

635 Research Issues in Landscape Architecture
Survey of research issues and methods in landscape architecture and planning. Designed to assist students preparing their research for master's theses and projects. Includes selecting a topic for this research, synthesizing the pertinent literature, developing research questions and selecting a faculty advisor.

651 Professional Practice
Models of professional office structure, including management, organization, and economics for private, public, and academic practice. Covers ethics, compensation, contracts, specifications, and business plan preparation.

661 Cultural Landscapes: Documentation, Values and Policy
An important course for landscape architects, planners, and other professionals interested in the cultural landscape, this course will introduce students to the identification, understanding, documentation and policy implications of cultural landscapes. While it will touch on the issues of both designed and vernacular landscapes, the focus of the course will be vernacular landscape.

691 Seminar
Topics vary by semester.

696 Independent Study
Credit, 1-6.

697W Special Topics - Interdisciplinary Design Collaboration
This course comprises a series of seminars that will provide designers in architecture and landscape architecture an understanding of the collaborative nature of the two professions, and a skillset to facilitate interdisciplinary collaborative practice. Credit, 1.

698A Master’s Project
Allows a student to work on an actual or demonstration project to explore aspects of landscape planning, design or processes related to landscape architecture. Credit, 1-6.

699 Master's Thesis
Preparation of a research thesis in an emerging or state-of-the-art area of landscape architecture. Credit, 1-9.

Regional Planning

545 Introduction to Land Use
The role of policy in guiding optimal growth. Examination of constitutional issues, controversies regarding growth management practices, techniques used in designing growth management strategies, and future trends in growth management.

574 City Planning
The contexts within which design, development, decision making, and deliberation of community plans take place. Topics include land-use regulation; environmental management; infrastructure, housing, and social services; current challenges; future trends and opportunities.

577 Urban Policies
Social, cultural, political, and economic analyses of urban policies and practices. Various disciplinary approaches used for critiquing and developing appropriate policies, including urban planning, anthropology, geography, political science, media studies, sociology, and economics. Includes service learning component.

580 Sustainable Cities
This course introduces students to the 3-E concept of sustainability: environment, economy, equity, and applies it to the built environment and policies at the municipal and regional level.

582 Landscape and Green Urbanism
Interdisciplinary course for upper level undergraduate and graduate students. Focus on the role of the built environment in urbanization and sustainability.

585 Planning for Climate Change
This course reads some of the most current literature on the future of the urban form given climate change, and allows time and shared space to reflect on what these coming changes mean for (primarily local) government as well as governance. The class focus will be on implications of these coming conditions for built form both now and in the future, with a goal of developing a working understanding of what municipal, regional, and state planners and policymakers need to know now about these conditions to provide leadership to communities. Credit, 3-4.

587 People and the Environment
Interdisciplinary course on the applications of environmental psychology research to planning and design. Topics include landscape preference, territoriality and defensible space, way finding, and restorative settings/therapeutic gardens.

591I Seminar - Sustaining Green Infrastructure Planning and Design
Guiding principles and best practices regarding the use of ecological processes in human-built systems for managing stormwater and wastewater, as well as for achieving other sustainability goals (e.g., human health, biodiversity). Analysis and assessment techniques to determine the siting and configuration of green infrastructure systems. Review of case study literature.

620 Quantitative Methods in Planning
This course provides aspiring professional planners with the core knowledge and skills necessary to analyze and communicate quantitative information. This course provides a basic grounding in statistical theory and how to apply these concepts to the solution of real-world problems. It also reviews common sources of public socio-demographic information, and discusses techniques for the effective communication of quantitative information.

625 Introduction to Geographic Information Systems for Planning
This is an introductory, graduate-level professional course in the use of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) in urban and regional planning and related fields. It emphasizes the analysis and effective visualization of spatial data, with application to real-world problems.

630 Theory and Practice of Public Participation
This course will introduce students to public participation at the practice level in planning. Lectures and class discussions will review current theory underpinning participation practice, and will critically evaluate the wide range of participation methods currently in use in planning practice. There will also be one or more exercises in participation implementation that occur outside standard class times, when we will join one of the other studio classes, and plan and run their participation process.

635 Research Issues in Landscape Architecture and Regional Planning
Survey of research issues and methods in landscape architecture and planning. Designed to assist students preparing their research for master's theses and projects. Includes selecting a topic for this research, synthesizing the pertinent literature, developing research questions and selecting a faculty advisor.

643 Economic Development Issues in Planning
This course surveys the contemporary practice of economic development in the United States. Its goal is to provide students with the requisite background to undertake a critical evaluation of economic development strategies. It begins with a broad overview of the contemporary practice, history and politics of economic development. Next it reviews some of the prevailing theories of regional economic growth and development. The second half of the course focuses on particular strategies of state and local economic development used in practice.

651 Planning History and Theory
Planning as a decision-making process, the attributes of the political and administrative environment within which planning takes place, and the implications of this environment for the planning process and the planner.

652 Tools and Techniques in Planning
Practical information, specific tools, regulatory processes, and analytic methods useful in the practice of public sector planning at the local level.

656 Judicial Planning Law
The law of land-use control as expressed in major judicial decisions in the U.S. Constitution, expansion and powers of municipal corporations; use of legal planning tools such as zoning, abatement of nuisance, eminent domain, etc.

661 Cultural Landscapes: Documentation, Values, and Policy
An important course for landscape architects, planners, and other professionals interested in the cultural landscape, this course will introduce students to the identification, understanding, documentation and policy implications of cultural landscapes. While it will touch on the issues of both designed and vernacular landscapes, the focus of the course will be vernacular landscape.

673 Spatial Analysis and Regional Development
This course is a hands-on study in regional and local economic, demographic and spatial analysis methods commonly used by planners and economic development policy analysts. 

675 Regional Planning Studio
The first in a sequence of workshop-type courses, to integrate skills and knowledge from conventional courses and apply them to representative planning problems. Instructional goals: to develop the skills and techniques for collecting, analyzing, synthesizing and presenting spatial and non-spatial data; and to develop a sense of judgement about the comprehensiveness and reliability of the data and its utility for planning decisions. Credit, 6.

691S Seminar - Cultural Landscapes: Documentation, Values and Policy
An important course for landscape architects, planners and other professionals interested in the cultural landscape, this course will introduce students to the identification, understanding, documentation and policy implications of cultural landscapes. While it will touch on the issues of both designed and vernacular landscapes, the focus for this course will be the vernacular landscape.

696 Independent Study
Credit, 1-6.

698 Practicum
Credit, 1-6.

698A Master’s Project
Credit, 1-6.

699 Master’s Thesis
Credit, 9.

891 Seminar in Advanced Planning Theory
Contact department for description.Credit, 1-3.

892C Seminar - PhD Workshop
Contact intructor for details. Credit, 1.

899 Doctoral Dissertation
Credit, 18.