Landscape architects team with S.C. DNR to design clean future for Bald Rock > GSA Business

The iconic Bald Rock Heritage Protect is very well regarded to Upstate locals for two things: impressive sights and rampant graffiti.

“While climbing, pictures and wildlife viewing are suitable makes use of of the home, the community now engages with it in destructive approaches these kinds of as graffiti, litter, chopping down trees for firewood and trampling patches of vegetation on the rock outcrop,” Austen Attaway, a heritage maintain biologist for the S.C. Department of Purely natural Assets, explained in a information launch.

S.C. DNR obtained the assets in 2001 to defend its geographic functions and uncommon plant lifetime, Attaway claimed. Now the agency is creating a grasp program to tackle the mismatch between the preserve’s intended intent and the way it is now treated.

It’s a trouble that involves a structure answer, a person which the landscape architecture school in Clemson University’s College of Architecture are experienced to create.

This is an option for us to lead, collaborate and give again to South Carolina in a way that is exceptional to our self-discipline,” Paul Russell, affiliate professor of landscape architecture, said in the news release.

“We’re looking at how do we transform Bald Rock from staying a vacation spot for graffiti to being a place for being outdoor with your spouse and children and pals,” he mentioned. Russell is top a group of landscape architects — which include faculty users Matthew Nicoletti and Lara Browning as well as graduate university student Annie Steele — to consult with SCDNR on the learn system.

In on the lookout for options to increase Bald Rock, the landscape architecture crew will overview the watershed scale of the property and examine the room to related homes such as Caesar’s Head Point out Park and Sassafras Mountain. Their objective will be to suggest the approaches in which style and design choices these as access details, trails and signage can shift the approaches website visitors interact with the land.

In addition to input from Clemson’s college, the master system study will have interaction Close friends of Bald rock Heritage Maintain, a nonprofit volunteer provider corporation focused to preserving and enhancing the website. The group’s volunteers consistently strategy occasions for litter choose-up and pressure washing to eliminate spray paint from the acres of exposed rock on the web site.

“This settlement signifies the initial stage towards innovative and sustainable remedies for the lots of issues that problem SCDNR’s mission,” stated Susan Jordan, president of Buddies of Bald Rock Heritage Maintain. “We are self-assured that the study will supply built options to deter vandalism, minimize servicing, permit restoration of plant and animal habitats, enrich the risk-free general public use of the house and secure and maintain the normal resources.”

The grasp system analyze is the commencing of a lengthier process, and Russell says the objective for his crew is to be ready to teach SCDNR as a design client, so that when the time is correct to make modifications at Bald Rock, the agency has the finest info feasible.

Customers of the group interested in finding out a lot more about ideas for Bald Rock or supplying comments to the examine are invited to get in touch with Attaway at [email protected] or 864-986-6242. People interested in supporting Buddies of Bald Rock Heritage Preserve’s volunteer initiatives can make contact with them at [email protected].