Groundwater is a vital resource for ecosystems, with its recharge process influenced by climate change and urbanization. The transformation of natural and urban landscapes and the over-extraction of groundwater contribute to its depletion and degradation. Groundwater recharge and management are intricately linked to land use and the landscape. Despite this close connection, spatially integrating groundwater recharge strategies in the landscape context remains underexplored. This systematic review synthesizes state-of-the-art research at the intersection of spatial planning, landscapes, and groundwater recharge. We employed a combination of bibliometric visualization and thematic analysis and reviewed 126 studies published between 1990 and April 2024 from the Scopus and Web of Science databases. Based on their objectives and outcomes, we found four prominent themes in these clusters: groundwater recharge potential studies, groundwater vulnerability studies, design-based studies, and participatory studies. When organized iteratively, these clusters can become potential building blocks of a framework for a landscape-based groundwater recharge approach. With interdisciplinary collaboration, spatial visualization and mapping, a co-creative design, and a feedback mechanism at its core, this approach can enhance stakeholder communication and translate highly specialized technical knowledge into adaptive, actionable insights. This study also highlights that including spatial design can help develop landscape-based groundwater recharge for long-term sustainable regional development.

This essay explores integrating experimental graphic methods into the design process to engage with more-than-human worlds. It is based on the graduation project ‘RE-Peat: Different Futures for the Peat Polders, a Social-Ecological Landscape in the Netherlands,’ which aims to transform degraded peatlands. Through various representation techniques, such as hand-drawn perception drawings and Gaia-graphic representation, peat is positioned as an actor and a design tool. Such methods aim to foster environmental sensitivity and holistic design ideas, acknowledging the needs of both human and non-human actors.

Rapid urbanization and climate change are the driving forces behind changing the urban landscape and affecting natural resources and the environment, particularly in the megacities of arid regions. Many of these cities face an acute water crisis leading to over-exploitation of groundwater resources. This over-exploitation has led to the depletion of aquifers, land infertility, saline intrusion, land subsidence, and harm to hydrological ecosystems. Globally, numerous studies have documented the potential of groundwater recharge (GWR) using GIS and remote sensing techniques. However, its practical application in a landscape context for sustainable urban and regional development is underexplored. In this study, we developed the landscape-based GWR concept by conducting a case study of Karachi city (Pakistan). We took physical landscape (surface and sub-surface) features and groundwater recharge potential as a base for design and planning to improve groundwater recharge and urban landscape. Moreover, we highlighted the added values of this approach besides recharging the depleted ground hydrological conditions and improving the urban landscape condition (i.e., social–ecological inclusiveness, sustainable future development, and interdisciplinary collaboration). The results indicated a negative impact of urbanization on groundwater recharge, especially in the alluvial zones and river valleys, underscoring the need for a spatial approach to safeguard GWR and guide development. Through this study, we propose that landscape-based GWR can be one of the potential solutions not only for the critical water crisis faced by rapidly urbanizing arid megacities but also for improving the overall quality of life and urban landscape. Furthermore, this holistic approach toward groundwater recharge can guide future urban development patterns, preservation of high groundwater recharge potential sites, and evolution toward sustainable development in arid regions where groundwater is the most significant yet vulnerable resource.

Design Project Data

Platform Ontwerp NL heeft ons, de auteurs van dit stuk, gevraagd om te reflecteren op ontwerpend onderzoek in de ateliers over de grote transitie opgaven die vlak voor de zomer zijn georganiseerd in het kader van Ontwerpend onderzoek NOVEX. Vanaf november 2023 loopt er een ontwerpend onderzoek traject, dat het ministerie van BZK faciliteert. Dit traject is bedoeld om de provincies te ondersteunen, die aan de Ruimtelijke voorstellen werken. In een aantal stappen gingen ontwerpbureaus aan de slag met beleidsinventarisatie, de analyse van prangende vraagstukken (hot topics) en van nationale overzichten die laten zien welke vraagstukken waar spelen en waar er provincieoverschrijdende kansen liggen om thema’s te verbinden. De ontwerpbureaus werken met de notities die de provincies produceren, waardoor de kaartbeelden die ontstaan, steeds preciezer worden.

The water-harvesting system of the ancient Sassi di Matera, in the Basilicata region of southern Italy, represents a clever way of living with water in an arid climate. The terrain, with its soft rocks (Calcarenite di Gravina), provided the foundation for the water-harvesting system that shaped the cave dwellings of Sassi physically, socially and culturally. People caught, guided and stored water in private and public spaces, mostly underground, ensuring its availability for all. In 1993 UNESCO declared the cave village a World Heritage Site. Unfortunately, the water-harvesting system of Sassi di Matera is no longer functioning. Its historic ingenuity is not as visible as the system deserves and its cultural and social values are almost forgotten. Using layered visual analysis – the illustrative method – knowledge can be collected and communicated in drawings to get insight regarding more resilient, circular, and people-related approaches (Bobbink, Chourairi and Di Nicola 2022). This article and the included drawings focus on the water system’s value, from which we can learn today.

The Faculty of Architecture at TU Delft lies in the low-lying part of the Netherlands; we research and teach water management and its spatial and social impact. For decades, the land was successfully drained and reclaimed, resulting in a comfortable life below sea level. However, due to various causes, this way of managing the delta is problematic today: the sea level is rising while land subsidence is ongoing. On the one hand, there is a surplus of rain- and river water, and at the same time, the land and the plants suffer from drought and water pollution; the country is densely occupied, and the world's second-largest agricultural exporter and therefore lacks space for many other programs like renewable energy harvesting, recreation, and nature development. Considering the pressure on the landscape, we need to rethink our delta. That’s why a research team proposed to the province of North Holland to test the installation of inner-boezem landscapes, which can keep water in the polder instead of pumping it out via the boezem network (discharge system) into the open water of rivers and sea. This water system scaling-down operation allows for more site-specific water management and can serve as a starting point for integrated landscape development. Preparing the brief for the design assignment based on the research included civil engineers and technical and ecological experts. Forty master students of the landscape architecture track worked for eight weeks on testing designs of inner-boezem landscapes in different locations: the peat polder landscape, a lakebed polder, and along the dune ridge. The designs showed that the inner-boezem landscapes deal well with flexible water levels and create opportunities for new ecological and recreational values. At the same time, the inner-boezem landscapes are initiators for developing innovative, more sustainable agricultural practices. The research by design results are discussed within the province of Noord Holland. Like in the “Room for the River ” project, the inner-boezem landscape, which can be seen as a “Room for the Polder Water” project, simultaneously allows for technical, ecological, and socio-economic improvement.

Considering ‘infrastructures as landscapes’ and ‘landscapes as infrastructures’, this article uses an open framework to reconsider the distinctive water infrastructure of France’s UNESCO-listed heritage Canal du Midi. More specifically, it profiles the Canal’s Mediterranean outlet. Viewed through a landscape architectonic lens, we investigate the canal, drawing on the theory of landscape narrative and using the illustrative method. The article identifies three crucial narratives – infrastructural, natural & environmental and social & cultural – that help to examine the spatial values of the Canal and its relationship with its southern coastal landscape. The study shows how the Canal du Midi has been transformed and has influenced its surroundings, becoming an integral part of the coastal landscape. We identify and analyse how the Canal functions as an infrastructure composition and an environmentally and culturally significant feature. The landscape narrative framework offers the possibility of sharpening the interpretation of water infrastructures beyond conventional problem-solving approaches by providing a holistic view of the Canal and its water landscapes. This, in turn, offers inspiration for the region's future development, which presently prioritises the preservation of the Canal du Midi and the regeneration of the surrounding area as distinct projects.

Digitalisation in landscape architecture education has changed the assignments students receive, how they work, are supervised, and their learning output. During the 27 years I have been teaching, design assignments have become more complex; due to increasing knowl¬edge and information gathering, the pressing challenges that society faces, and the vast possibilities that digital tools offer. As a result, the discipline changed from a design-orient¬ed practised, coping primarily with questions on aesthetics of space, to a field expected to contribute to solving today's problematic relationship between humans and nature using the most advanced digital data and tools. These digital tools, like the hand drawings, need much practice and are not always content-driven since the produced images look polished, often not leaving an opening for discussion.

Nevertheless, the length of study has not increased; quite the contrary. Therefore, be¬cause of the expansion of the discipline, educators must be selective about the educational program they offer. At TU Delft, for example, the master track of Landscape Architecture focuses on design. In the first year, the program strictly teaches disciplinary knowledge and skills and challenges the students to become critical thinkers in their graduation year. Students themselves formulate their graduation assignment within an offered research top¬ic. To do so, they must reflect on their discipline, knowledge and skills and question every step they take. We consciously ask them to leave gaps and tell them to limit themselves. Other schools focus on other topics, and their students gather different knowledge. In the Netherlands, three Landscape Architecture schools provide three various programs. Ideally, all schools cover the discipline's breadth based on the general fundamentals of Landscape Architecture. After graduation, our alumni are ready to contribute to disciplinary, interdisci¬plinary, or transdisciplinary collaborations to solve complex assignments and create new healthy environments open for change.

In this exhibition models of the landscape biography and designs for the future of Midden-Delfland are exhibited. Organised by TU Delft and gemeente Delft in Stadskantoor Delft.

This book is about the first ten years of the master track in Landscape Architecture at the Department of Urbanism in the Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment at TU Delft. It delves into the personal, educational, didactical, organizational and, above all, substantive dimensions of the teaching of this appealing and highly relevant discipline at the academic level. The book has three parts. The first part – PROFILE – discusses the context and events that led up to the development of the master track and influenced its further development – from the very first landscape architecture related appointments and initiatives in the 1940s to the first day in September 2010 when the programme began with seven participants, and on to the celebration of its tenth anniversary in 2021. Infographics show the numbers and profiles of the student population and illustrate the structure of the master curriculum. The second section – WORK – contains snapshots of drawings, photos, collages and other graphic material produced by our students. The images are loosely grouped according to the five stages in the design process: exploring, understanding, conceptualizing, modifying and engineering the landscape. Interspersed with this kaleidoscopic variety of images you will find a series of short essays on key topics in landscape architecture education written by the present staff of the Landscape Architecture section. Finally, at the end of the book you will find a few lists – PEOPLE – of all those involved: students, staff and guest lecturers. They are the ones who made and still make the master track such a wonderful community to belong to.

This issue of Spool – ‘Drawing Time’ – departs from the observation that the metropolitan landscape is subject to time, in many ways. The metropolitan landscape, as it has been studied in Spool over the years, is conceived as the interrelation between urban, infrastructural, rural and natural formations: a dynamic, intertwined and layered urban-landscape structure. The urban condition is viewed from the perspective of the landscape as a permanent underlying substructure and as physical open space with its own spatial, compositional and perceptual characteristics. Time aspects of the metropolitan landscape can be found in processes of growth and decay, seasonal manifestations, disruptive forces of wind and water and also in the ways in which humans inhabit and use space or in which urban development processes take place. Designing for the metropolitan landscape means dealing with a wide range of dynamic phenomena, unstable systems and variable conditions. It implies the exploration of future situations, bridging time spans from seasons to decades and design tasks from small-scale interventions to large-scale strategies. It connects landscape operations that build upon the garden, the park and the forest to complex, layered design strategies for transformation, migration and climate change. This Spool issue discusses the importance of time in such design processes, and its reciprocal relation to representation.

The Chinampas are a system of floating gardens in the Valley of Mexico, including Mexico City, allowing for effective agriculture and sustainable water management since approximately 200 BC (Rojas-Rabiela 1993). Vernacular water systems like the Chinampas create opportunities for landscape architects to learn from historical approaches to water management to solve today’s challenges (Bobbink and Ryu 2017; Bobbink 2019). Through a layered visual analysis – the illustrative method – vernacular knowledge about the Chinampas was collected and communicated by drawings to gather (new) visions toward more resilient, circular and interdisciplinary approaches (Surajaras and Rey 2021). The research is part of the “Circular Water Stories LAB,” TU Delft, the Netherlands (https://circularwaterstories.org). Once the case study has been systematically documented, its circular character provides insights into landscape-based approaches to water-related cultivation. From there, it is possible to discuss the value of the traditional water system in addressing today’s challenges.

In this exhibition landscape biographies of Midden Delfland are presented in objects and timelines. The exhibition took place in Museum Het Tramstation, 15 October 2022 - 15 January 2023.

To analyze traditional water systems and their development over time, researchers I. Bobbink and M. Ryu developed the so-called Illustrative Method in 2017 based on former water systems studies (Bobbink and Loen 2010; Ryu 2012). The method visualizes connections between spatial, social and cultural aspects of water systems in a standardized way. It provides insight into unique local patterns, forms the foundation for comparative analysis and can ultimately inform the creation of new water systems for future sustainable development.

The course AR1LA051, which is part of the landscape architecture master of the TU Delft, explores the water system of the Dutch lowlands. In a collaborative effort 15 students, split in seven teams, work together to transform a “boezem”-system on the fringe of Rotterdam. The individual efforts of each group and the overall group strategy are summarized in this book. This module was the first big group project for the first year master students and as such required a lot of organizational effort and a general willingness to discuss and find consensus and compromise. While this was made more difficult by the COVID-19 pandemic, the group nonetheless collaborated together to deliver a comprehensive project.

The Dutch polder landscape still needs to be defined again. This time, the transformation is no longer to make the delta area habitable through reclamation and management, and to improve agricultural efficiency through land consolidation, but to respond to the challenges brought about by today's extreme climate change and population growth. The goal is to form a more flexible and more livable landscape that is more inclusive to people, plants, and animals. This article discusses the formation process, status quo, potential, challenges, and possible future of the Rotter River Basin, a representative of the polder landscape. The abstract design principles behind the proposal described in this article also inspire polder landscapes in other parts of the world.

Observeren is een van de meest basale methode van onderzoek; in de sociale wetenschappen, maar zeker ook binnen de ingenieurswetenschappen (techniek en ontwerp). Maar hoe doe je dat eigenlijk? Het eenvoudige antwoord; dit gaat vanzelf. Wij zijn de hele dag door aan het waarnemen met alle zintuigen. Onze hersenen krijgen per seconden 4,2 miljoen prikkels van onze zintuigen, maar ook van ons lichaam (honger, dorst, pijn). Van al deze informatie bereiken er 5 tot 9 prikkels ons bewustzijn (Miller, 1956). Observeren in onderzoek en ontwerp vraagt dus enige focus om niet te verzanden in alle beschikbare informatie. In dit hoofdstuk gaan we in op hoe we waarnemen, wat we kunnen waarnemen in de (on)gebouwde omgeving en hoe je gericht en bewust observatietechnieken kunt inzetten om meer van je planlocatie te weten te komen. Daarnaast bespreken wij hoe je waarnemingen kan vastleggen als ingang voor het ontwerp(en). In dit hoofdstuk gaat het ook over het waarnemen van de sociale omgeving, naast het waarnemen van gebouwde en natuurlijke omgeving.

In this paper, concepts for deploying climate resilient design in deltaic regions which encounter environmental challenges are explored. Today, most deltas experience persistent flooding and long-term waterlogging which adversely affects the livelihood of its inhabitants. A new approach was formulated to rethink design and planning pedagogies in the discipline of landscape architecture at Delft University of Technology, to visualize open-ended spatial transformations involving both the landscape architect and the inhabitants over longer periods of time. The graduates proposed flexible spatial frameworks that integrate time and people1. This results in design interventions that do not rely on a fixed plan, but rather propose and visualize a process using a ‘water calendar’ as the driving force. The spatial water calendar is a chart that helps to represent time linked to space and water which can be useful to enumerate, elucidate, and determine time-based fluctuations in a landscape and make decisions accordingly. The idea was prompted by ancient calendars that were based on the rhythm of seasons – a method which farmers often used. However, the spatial water calendar also integrates other processes which are influenced by water, focussing specifically on the spatial impact, thereby becoming a design tool for landscape architects. The calendar developed in the Circular Water Stories lab is an open-ended framework stirred by a sequence of spatial drawings showing the temporal and social processes in relation to human-made interventions, resulting in spatial transformations through time and scale. Because working with a calendar is highly participatory in nature, the spatial water calendar will be more meaningful in vulnerable geographies2 where there is still a strong connection between people and landscape. Nevertheless, in other parts of the world, we imagine that this approach also opens new possibilities for landscape architects to engage with dynamic sites.