Voluntary guidelines address low-impact design, construction, and maintenance. By: Stephani L. Miller While third-party rating systems for sustainable homes provide ambitious green benchmarks, they give only cursory attention to site and landscape sustainability. Stepping in to fill the void is a new set of voluntary guidelines addressing the sustainable design, construction, and maintenance of sites and landscapes. The Sustainable Sites Initiative Rating System is designed to be applied to all types of designed landscapes independent of any building, including the site of a commercial structure, a state park, a public garden, a new-home development common area, or a private home’s backyard. Sites may be urban or rural, previously developed, or undeveloped. The Sustainable Sites Initiative (SSI) is a partnership between the American Society of Landscape Architects  (ASLA), the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center at The University of Texas at Austin, and the U.S. Botanic

Garden . In development for the past four years, the rating system has been influenced by several stakeholder organizations, as well as by professionals in a variety of fields, including civil engineers, horticulturalists, and economists. Based on 10 principles, the guidelines are designed to create self-sustaining, regenerative landscapes that function as nature intended, performing the same “services” provided by any healthy environment—among them cleaning air, filtering and storing water, sequestering carbon, supporting wildlife, regulating local climates and contributing to a balanced global climate, and preventing soil erosion. It also requires project teams pursuing certification to develop long-term maintenance plans for the landscape, to ensure continuing performance as it matures and evolves, and rewards teams that monitor and evaluate a site’s performance over time and use innovative sustainable practices and strategies. http://www.ecohomemagazine.com/news/2009/11/new-rating-system-for-sustainable-landscapes-launches.aspx

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New Rating System for Sustainable Landscapes Launches