Med vand- og landskab som aktører i byudvikling: Kortet i mødet mellem planlægningspraksisser

Climate change imply that water bodies and landscapes change with increased momentum and force, thereby altering the prerequisites for urban settlements and development. Combined with an increased tendency towards urban growth and densification, this constitutes a wicked problem. From various discourses concerning green infrastructures, ecosystem services and nature‐based solutions, as well as from positions such as landscape urbanism and ecological urbanism there is a need for re-orientation towards spatial and metabolic relationships between urban developments and deep water- and landscape structures and processes. This entails a need for an adjustment of applied methodologies in large-scale urban planning practice (PLAN), where water and landscapes must be incorporated as shaping and function-determining actors. There is a presumption within the landscape architectural profession (LARK), that landscape architects can contribute with relevant knowhow and approaches. The aim of this research project is to investigate whether such a contribution is possible in practice and how it may look. The project is empirically driven, case based, pragmatically oriented, and utilizes various research methods, such as qualitative interviews, observation, document studies, interaction and Research through Design (RtD). Aiming to assess how LARK may contribute to the mentioned transition process in PLAN, I have conducted two case studies: one in a municipal planning context (case PLAN), another in a landscape architect company (case LARK). The results show significant epistemological differences between the practices examined. Methods in case LARK seem oriented towards creation of artistic works, and operate with a mono-disciplinarily rooted focus on the spatial-aesthetic order in the landscape, which does not seem ample to address the complexity of the problem on a planning level. However, LARK can possibly contribute with valuable approaches to generate engaging landscape narratives, and to employ landscape mapping as an engine to craft visions and proposals. Additionally, I have identified the use of analogue maps as a common denominator and possible link between the two practices. On this backdrop, an RtD-based case study (case DEMO) has been conducted. The aim was to qualify the applicability of the (in case LARK) identified methodological approaches and their potential to enhance the inclusion of water- and landscapes as actors in PLAN. Through an interdisciplinary workshop process three methodological components: ‘maps understood and negotiated’, ‘maps experienced’, as well as ‘maps‐redrawn’, were developed. Assembled around dialogue-sparking ‘thick’ maps, parti-cipants built common relations to sitespecific water- and landscape actors, and composed multidisciplinary narratives as precursors to strategic plans. The results show the contours of a third compositional practice in which maps serve as mediators between multiple actors.