Introduction

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joe robertson thank you so much for

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joining me today

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um i know that you’re a principal of

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landscape architecture at dialogue

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and uh i’ve asked you to help me to

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understand

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some things around the ecological

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footprints

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and uh what it means we’re taking

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michael sorkin’s

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um idea from his 250 things an architect

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should know about how to calculate

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ecological footprints

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uh so i thought i would start with just

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a question about

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the definitions because there’s a couple

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of words that are bantered around

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there’s one that’s ecological

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footprint and the other one is carbon

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footprint

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and they’re they’re very different but

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i’d love to know what your thoughts are

Ecological Footprint vs Carbon Footprint

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on

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on what that difference is if you would

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yeah

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for for me and from my understanding

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ecological footprint is a bit of a

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broader definition and it’s sort of

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the sense of what is the human impact on

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natural capital so it looks at

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sort of many things within the ecosystem

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not just carbon and then the carbon

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footprint is a bit of a subsect of that

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where it specifically looks at

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the amount of carbon that we use

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for any given task or activity

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so they’re both different ways of sort

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of measuring and

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quantifying human impact on the

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environment

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and i know there’s um the ecological

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footprint there’s actually a calculator

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that individuals can use so

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we might include that with the with the

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post that we do

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people can calculate their own footprint

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i know i just did and it’s

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fascinating um but i i want to i want to

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start with this question of resiliency

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because

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i i guess one of the questions is why do

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we measure why is it important to

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measure ecological footprints and

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what does resiliency have to do with it

Ecological Footprint and Resiliency

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or does it have anything to do with

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resiliency

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i think they are intuitively and

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inherently linked together i think one

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of the reasons we started measuring

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ecological footprint is to help people

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quantify and understand something that’s

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a bit of an

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ephemeral concept it’s hard i think for

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many people to see

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the impact that we have on our world

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especially from an environmental

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standpoint

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you know people are just living their

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lives and

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um so it became a tool that was

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developed in the late 90s

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to help people be able to see that every

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action that we have

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has a reaction and in some cases

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an impact on in most cases an impact on

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the environment

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and you know there’s so many people in

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the world that are data driven and need

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that sort of

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tangible data and so i think that that

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becomes a really

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valuable tool for those people to

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understand

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you know how we’re actually changing our

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world

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and in most cases for the negative

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and then that ties into the idea of

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resiliency because

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we’ve started to to make positive

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changes and i think

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when i talked about this earlier kovid

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has actually

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allowed the world to rebound in some

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respects and for us to be able to see

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measurable resiliency less traffic

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on the canals in venice has meant that

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there have been dolphins the air

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quality in the world is generally better

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because there’s less

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car traffic less airplane traffic so

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we’re starting to see

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sort of the resiliency within the

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ecosystems rebounding

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right and and um when we think about

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resiliency that’s a

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that’s a goal that’s probably hopefully

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never ending for us as

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as a human humans existing on a planet

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that’s kind of got finite resources

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um but the ecological footprint uh

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is there and i know you’ve studied it in

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environmental science and have a great

Origins of Ecological Footprint

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deal of knowledge about it but

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is there a basis of when that came into

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being or how did the measurements

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start to come forward as in terms of an

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economic

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ecological footprint the the book i

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referenced this book so it was actually

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written

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in the late 90s um sort of at the tail

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end of that kind of

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resurgent of environmentalism and it it

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became

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this is really one of the founding

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documents i think that speaks to

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um how to start quantifying that that

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conversation and that reaction

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and um you know we’ve learned a lot

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since the time that that book has been

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published and i think it still is one of

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those foundational documents

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but we see it spinning out into things

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like

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the carbon footprint and now this notion

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of life cycle analysis where we look at

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the impacts from cradle to grave

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especially around design and

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construction

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and then how that ties into sort of the

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conversation about resiliency as well

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so i think this becomes one of those

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foundational building blocks that’s

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really um

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led to a generational conversation about

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our impact on the environment measuring

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it and hopefully

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changing human action

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and i know you had sent an image uh

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about the carbon the ecological

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footprint and a gentleman’s name

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matthias wagermagel

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is on the bottom of that image and i

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started doing a little research about

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him

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and realized his premise is very much

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focused on considering physical capital

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versus financial capital

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and this notion of needing to quantify

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what you started to talk about is very

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interesting in the sense

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it’s um i guess if we

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have grown away or lost touch from the

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land and

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nature and what it does in its

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replenishment capacity

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then perhaps that quantification can

Financial Analysis

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bring us back

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more in touch with that or what what is

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your take on why bringing in financial

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analysis in that way again it’s

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something that’s easy for people to

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understand

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we learn at a very early age that things

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cost money

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i remember playing with the fisher-price

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cash register

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you know probably at the age of two and

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three and now i’ve seen

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kids now there’s a fisher price debit

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machine like we teach kids

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the value of money very early um but we

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don’t necessarily teach them how to

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value

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you know nature and ecology and

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preservation of wild spaces and so again

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framing up that conversation in terms

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that most people understand

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creates a common language and a common

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space to start talking

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about that and that’s one of the things

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that

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sort of life cycle assessment does is it

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doesn’t

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it takes a project beyond the the

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capital costs of that moment in

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construction and

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extends it into the the

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value of the materials that went into

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the construction and also the values of

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demobilizing or demolishing the building

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at the end of its life so again it’s

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putting everything in the context of

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a metric to measure that we all

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understand

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and it’s allowing us to objectively look

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at what we build

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and how it affects or blocks certain

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things

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exactly yeah um i’m

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i’m curious to bring in this idea of

Community Wellbeing

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community

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uh well-being and it’s it’s something

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that

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uh your practice has been very involved

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with but

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what’s that relationship with community

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well-being and footprints

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in your view i think community

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well-being becomes

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a piece that we need to measure that we

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haven’t in the past

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and so we’re starting to appreciate its

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value so

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from a design point of view there’s

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costs that go into building a park space

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and there’s values to that but a lot of

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those values are intangible

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and community well-being is one of those

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intangible values

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so if we can start to bring that into

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the conversation i think it just creates

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a more

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holistic and fully faceted version of

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the same conversation

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and um a park for example may cost

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x dollars to build but it could last for

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a hundred years

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and it provides a space for people to

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have access

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to nature which we know has a measurable

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impact on their physical and mental

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health

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it provides spaces for them to recreate

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um to socialize

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all of these positive benefits and if we

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can start to quantify those in a similar

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way that we are quantifying

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natural capital it starts to put value

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around that and then

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lead to i think more informed

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discussions on how we prioritize

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how we spend our civic money how we

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allocate civic space

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yeah i noticed the government of canada

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now has

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a well-being indicator to some extent

Canadas Wellbeing Indicator

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and

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is that something that’s a new

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initiative or do you have any sense on

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where that has come from

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yeah i think that’s a very new

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initiative and it is coming out of this

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uh somewhat recent recognition that

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mental health is just as important as

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physical health

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and you can actually measure the health

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of a city

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in terms of the happiness of its

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citizens and you know this conversation

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started

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probably you know five or ten years ago

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but i think it’s become again so

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intensified because of the pandemic

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because now we’re

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physically and socially isolated and

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there’s this tension around balancing

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physical health with mental health and

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you know it’s really demonstrating that

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we need to look at what makes our cities

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well much more holistically than i think

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we’ve done in the past

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yeah that’s interesting so the effects

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of the pandemic have helped us

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to rethink in a lot of ways how’s that

Changing Design Thinking

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changing your design this is probably

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the last question but how is that

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changing your

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design thinking right at the moment is

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there anything that’s adjusted

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we’re starting to talk about it and i

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think that’s going to be the next

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challenge as

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designers to face you know right away we

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see

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changes in that there’s an increased

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demand for

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outdoor spaces where we can gather and

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recreate and be social but in

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in a safe and healthy manner you’ve seen

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it in edmonton with the resurgence of

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interest and use of the river valley

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an increase in bikes an increase in pets

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if you want to get a bike or a pet in

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the city of edmonton it’s really hard

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now because everyone has gone and done

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that

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and so that means there’s more people

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out in our parks and open spaces

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and so then you know do we need to

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increase the space to accommodate that

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use and we’ve seen that

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on white avenue where the patio spaces

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have expanded into the streets

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to accommodate increased pedestrian

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traffic instead of

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the space that was previously allocated

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for cars

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and so hopefully these changes will

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become

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permanent and in other cities in the

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world paris has

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permanently turning over some of their

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roads to pedestrians and cars

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because we’re changing how we use use

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this public space

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and i think that’s going to be a really

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interesting conversation going forward

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it will be it’s almost been like we’ve

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had this pilot

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exactly yeah that’s the best way

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to to create civic change like this is

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is a pilot project and probably the most

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famous example that i know of is

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jeanette city

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khan who piloted the idea of

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pedestrianizing

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times square in new york city probably

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one of the busiest

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intersections in the world before and

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now it’s a pedestrian space and she made

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that transformation through a pilot

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project

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yeah that’s a very interesting and

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groundbreaking projects

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and i think gal architects was involved

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in guiding them in that work

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yes yeah joe we could keep talking but

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this has been a great start and we’ll

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post some information about calculating

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our ecological footprints and

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hopefully the footprints will go down

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right now north america we’re quite

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we have quite big feet in north america

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we do

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yeah so hopefully we can work on that

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but thank you so much for your time

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well thank you so much this was a lot of

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fun yeah thank you

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take care bye

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