Sasaki Oversees Design of New Waterfront Park for Port of Los Angeles

WATERTOWN, Mass., July 14, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Sasaki, a leading integrated planning and design firm committed to thoughtful, sustainable solutions, announced today that it has successfully completed a major landscape design project for the Port of Los Angeles (POLA). The sustainable accomplishments and innovative design of the new Wilmington Waterfront Park effectively doubles the amount of public open space available and demonstrates Sasaki's abilities as an inter-disciplinary firm, capable of performing landscape architecture, architecture and civil engineering services alike.

(Photo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20110714/NE35566 )

Sasaki's teams in Boston and San Francisco collaborated with the Port of Los Angeles and its staff, members of the community and all affected agencies and stakeholders to craft a master plan for the 30-acre park that would create a natural buffer between the Los Angeles neighborhood of Wilmington and port operations. Residents will now experience a higher quality of life due to measures taken to reduce air and noise pollution and restored visual access of the once-hidden L.A. waterfront. The design is contemporary, yet also references the community's deep heritage by including features such as a plaza for large gatherings that is culturally compatible with Wilmington's Latino population. The sculptural, faceted quality of the landforms in the park is repeated at the finer grain, evident in the architecture of the pavilions, the selection of the site lighting and furnishings, and in the design of the joint patterns on the ground plane. Integral to the visual expression of the design is a complement of sustainable landscape strategies.

"The Wilmington Waterfront Park addresses the community's desire to have accessible greenspace combined with sustainable initiatives designed to improve our surroundings," said Chris Brown, engineer for POLA. "By collaborating with community representatives and leveraging the expertise of our design partner Sasaki, the Wilmington Waterfront Park delivers on these goals and serves as a model for future waterfront developments."

The park's impact on the surrounding communities is significant, with extensive measures taken to improve air quality and reduce noise and light pollution on the adjacent residences. The Wilmington Waterfront Park serves as a natural buffer between port operations and nearby neighborhoods, containing innovative features such a 16-foot high landform along the southern border of the park that creates a platform offering stunning views of the nearby coastline while simultaneously buffeting noise from the port.  In an effort to curb Los Angeles' notorious pollution woes, the team elected to coat a test panel of retaining wall surface with titanium dioxide, a substance that reduces  nitrogen oxide and helps mitigate the impact of airborne pollutants from nearby industrial facilities. The test panel will be monitored for effectiveness, with the goal of coating the entire 35,000 square feet of wall surface.  The planting of approximately two acres of tree groves in the surrounding landscape further enhances air quality and sequesters carbon on the site. Lighting for the park was carefully chosen to provide adequate night time illumination without imposing glare on the surrounding area, and dark-sky compliant fixtures were specified. Last, an extensive stormwater management system includes 5,000 linear feet of subsurface stone French drains along walkways, planter beds and low points in the landscape.

"The societal improvements that the Wilmington Waterfront Park provides truly demonstrate the positive influence landscape architecture, architecture and civil engineering can have on communities," said Steve Hamwey, PE, HASLA, principal of Sasaki. "The Port of Los Angeles stands as an example to other municipalities considering revitalization of their downtowns and waterfronts, showcasing the potential these sites contain and the ways in which they can be transformed to yield social and environmental improvements for all."

About Sasaki

Sasaki is an integrated planning and design firm committed to realizing thoughtful, sustainable solutions to our clients' unique problems. Drawing on the collaboration and diversity of ideas that defines our inter-disciplinary firm, our teams take a personal approach to creating award-winning spaces and places for our institutional, civic and commercial clients. We are engaged in nearly all areas of design, including Master Planning, Strategic Planning, Urban Design, Landscape Architecture, Civil Engineering, Architecture, Interior Design, and Graphic Design. Sasaki is a mid-sized firm of 250 professionals working throughout the United States and internationally from our offices in Boston and San Francisco. For more information, visit www.sasaki.com.

SOURCE Sasaki