An Interview with John J. Reynolds, FASLA-Champion of Parks and Land Stewardship
ASLA’s Public Practice Advisory Committee’s “Policy Shapers” series spotlights landscape architects who are active in shaping public policy. This interview was conducted by PPAC member Juanita Shearer-Swink, FASLA.

In an interview with Juanita Shearer-Swink, FASLA, John J. Reynolds, FASLA, of the National Park Service discusses his career with the Park Service and why landscape architects are vital to the NPS mission.

In 2002, ASLA presented you with the LaGasse Medal in recognition of your distinguished career, which has been dedicated to the management and conservancy of natural resources and public lands. Tell us about some of the leadership roles in your career path.

I joined the National Park Service (NPS) in 1961 as a student and worked during the summers in Yellowstone National Park, San Francisco, and the Guadalupe Mountains in Texas. I began my full-time career in the Park Service after getting my Bachelor’s (of Science) degree in Landscape Architecture from Iowa State University and then an MLA at the State University College of Forestry at Syracuse University.

I started working as a landscape architect in the NPS office in Philadelphia. I worked on many long-range plans for parks, including Yosemite and new parks in Alaska. I was regional director for the mid-Atlantic region; manager of the Denver Service Center; regional director for the Pacific West Region; and then deputy director of the National Park Service from 1993 to 1996, which put me in the position of managing day-to-day operations nationwide.

The time I spent on the U.S. Delegation to the World Heritage Committee was also very rewarding—I had some really wonderful assignments in very different places overseas, including Great Britain, the Netherlands, India, Poland, Japan, Saudi Arabia, and Venezuela. One of the greatest things about the Park Service is that it offers such a broad range of environments and types of projects.

You retired from NPS in 2002, but you are still working for the Park Service, just in a different capacity.

Yes. Now I work for the National Park Foundation, which was established by Congress in 1967 to connect the public with national parks. I served as the executive vice president for Park Grants & Strategic Alliances and am now EVP for National Park Centennial Planning, so I work on support programs for the National Park System. We raise private funds that enable us to make grants that foster education, creating innovative partnerships and increasing public awareness.

One of the Foundation’s innovative programs takes young people on electronic field trips. They visit national parks through their computers at school. The teachers sign up in advance, and based on the number of students in their classes, we estimate that 37 million students logged on to the first one. This program, which is done in collaboration with Ball State University, has taken young people to Carlsbad Caverns and Hawaii Volcanoes National Parks, and Manzanar National Historic Site (a Japanese American internment center in World War II) in California. By exposing students to history and the outdoors and its beauty, I think we can build a greater understanding of our nation.

I am also working on long-range planning at the Foundation. In 2016, the National Park Service will celebrate its centennial. At the Foundation, we are looking ahead at the role that we should play. The primary focus will be education, youth, and diversity. Building new alliances will continue to play a significant role in achieving our mission.

What led you to landscape architecture? Were you always focused in this direction?

I think it began when I was born in Yellowstone National Park. My father was a park ranger. In high school, I thought that I wanted to be an engineer, but I came home at Christmas and decided that it did not seem to be the right fit. I was interested in biology, horticulture, art, and design, as well as engineering. I guess that my father thought that the mixture of things sounded like the landscape architects he worked with, so he took me to the regional NPS office in Omaha. They showed me all this amazing work that really was a combination of all my interests.

The wonderful thing about our profession is the breadth of the kinds of things you can be interested in and still base it on your relationship with the land. It gives you the ability to take in all that makes up the human experience with the land. Look at the urban form that Tom Balsley is creating in New York City and the work that Roberto Burle Marx has done in Brazil. There are so many permutations that all come out of the same sensibility: beauty of all kinds, whether you are doing a long-range plan or a regional system or a pocket park.

PPAC: Having worked in so many areas of the NPS, are there some specific projects that have been particularly satisfying for you?

JJR: I enjoyed working on the studies that identified new parks in Alaska, the long-range plans for Yosemite that form the basis of today’s implementation strategy, and the North Cascades National Park in Washington State; leading the process of creating the NPS's Guiding Principles of Sustainable Design; and leading the task force to create ASLA’s Declaration on the Environment and Development, a precursor to ASLA’s Code of Environmental Ethics.

Serving five years on the U.S. delegation to the World Heritage Committee, including three years as head of the delegation, really was the best job in the world. I had always wanted to contribute at that scale and working on the World Heritage Committee allowed me to achieve something I had always hoped to do. There is also the work that I was able to accomplish at the Landscape Architecture Foundation, which I chaired in 1998. We worked through a long-range strategic planning process, which allowed us to begin implementing the strategic plan, the first stage of which was the Capital Campaign, which has had a lasting effect on the profession’s effect in society and ASLA.

PPAC: What would you recommend to landscape architects who are looking for ways to bring positive change in the public realm?

JJR: The country needs to mature from a pioneer mentality to the realization that it is more heavily populated and urbanized. Our profession needs to help people grow into an understanding of valuing and caring for the land: often referred to as land husbandry. There are signs that people are thinking differently.

There are new coalitions of people finding common ground in valuing the land. Ranchers and conservationists are working together on long-term solutions for responsible land management. Religious groups are applying faith-based commitments to care for the earth. Landscape architects must be able to help people test the outcomes of these newly found coalitions and initiatives at all scales and be prepared to facilitate the solutions that they are identifying. This growing awareness of the land can turn into a great national dialogue on the environment and the way we wish to live.

It is really important for our young practitioners and students to be as broadly based as possible. Being exposed to information from many different sources, including the arts and sciences, will better prepare them to be successful contributors. The broader their range of knowledge and expertise, the better they are able to engage in this evolving public debate. The broader their experiences and education, the better. The breadth of knowledge provides landscape architects with many different ways to become connected to issues and people—all part of having a strong base to build upon.

Volunteering and service in our communities and government offer landscape architects some significant opportunities. There are two ways to look it. By volunteering your expertise you are sharing your knowledge and commitment to the land with others. When you volunteer in situations through which you are exposed to new things it promotes personal growth and the ability to work more comprehensively with people. It is part of taking in all that makes up the human experience with the land and sharing it.

The PPAC will be profiling policy shapers who are active in any arena, from local to global, and who are concerned with any of the wide array of issues related to landscape architecture. Please contact Jennifer Strassfeld (jstrassfeld@asla.org) if you are interested in being interviewed for this series.