ASLA and IFLA Celebrate Green Solutions for a Blue Planet
With representatives from 46 countries in attendance and well over 4,000 registrants, the 2006 ASLA Annual Meeting & EXPO and 43rd IFLA World Conference was a rousing success—topping registration numbers from last year and setting the stage for San Francisco.

Denis Carmichael, FASLA, ASLA Past President, addresses the 200 ASLA Annual Meeting & EXPO and 43rd IFLA World Congress.

By all accounts, the 2006 ASLA Annual Meeting & EXPO and 43rd IFLA World Congress was a resounding success. The joint meeting drew 4,364 attendees, beating last year’s registration numbers by over 500 registrants. Minneapolis 2006 now ranks as the third largest meeting in ASLA history, behind San Francisco 1986 and Boston 1999. ASLA staff is aiming to replace San Francisco 1986 with San Francisco 2007 for the number one spot in attendance.

The meeting was also attended by a wide variety of professionals, with close to 500 students in attendance, and representatives from 46 countries adding an international flair to the proceedings.

In keeping with the theme of the meeting, Green Solutions for a Blue Planet, ASLA leadership touted landscape architects’ long history of being stewards of the land, and urged the profession to continue working to create sustainable built environments.

“This has already been called the Green Century, and landscape architects are well positioned to bring that promise to fruition,” Past President Denis Carmichael, FASLA, said in his address to the Opening General Session. “As landscape architects, we have the knowledge, we have the tools, and we have the experience to effect positive change. We must rise to the occasion and take a leadership role in the health of our planet.”

Pat Caughey, FASLA, who was sworn in as President during the closing session of the meeting echoed Carmichael’s sentiments, saying he would make stewardship, leadership, and promotion of the profession the primary focus of his tenure as president. “We are the professionals, who by training and desire, are the most able to respond to the earth’s needs,” Caughey said in his address. “First, we can design walkable communities. Second, we can create sustainable environments. And third, we can protect and preserve sensitive habitats.”

Caughey also noted that landscape architects must begin to take stronger leadership roles in the wider design community, harkening back to Frederick Law Olmsted’s role in the development of the 1893 Columbian Exhibition in Chicago. “The design team wouldn’t make a single decision without his involvement,” Caughey noted. “He wasn’t afraid to state his opinion or to hold firm to his convictions. That’s what made him a natural leader. Think of what we could do if we had ego like that.”

The new president also urged ASLA members to become advocates for the profession by serving as mentors and talking about the profession outside of their offices. Caughey pointed to the ACE Mentor program, which ASLA has become heavily involved in within the past year as an opportunity for mentoring, adding, “we can’t rely on others to do our public relations… We need to take every opportunity to be in the public eye.”

One of the most significant avenues for getting in the public eye has been the ASLA green roof, which Nancy Somerville, ASLA executive vice president and CEO, noted has garnered nationwide coverage for the landscape architecture profession.

“The project,” Somerville said, “has already drawn more media attention to the profession than any event in recent memory. Coverage has appeared in more than 130 outlets and counting. Print coverage alone has reached more than 56 million readers to date.” Somerville also pointed to television coverage of the ASLA green roof as a significant milestone. The project was featured prominently in a CNN segment that was subsequently picked up for syndication on local affiliates of all three major networks.

Finally, Somerville put into words what the 2006 ASLA Annual Meeting & EXPO and 43rd IFLA World Congress demonstrated—that it’s a very good time to be a landscape architect. She cited figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics that show landscape architects “have the distinction of being the fastest growing of all the design professions,” noting that demand for landscape architecture services is projected to expand 18 to 26 percent by the year 2014. Somerville also said that salaries are growing along with that demand, with the average total compensation—excluding benefits—coming in at $89,700, an increase of more than 20 percent since 2004.