Routledge Handbook of Landscape Character Assessment Current Approaches to Characterisation and Assessment

In this multi-authored book, senior practitioners and researchers offer an international overview of landscape character approaches for those working in research, policy and practice relating to landscape.

Over the last three decades, European practice in landscape has moved from a narrow, if relatively straightforward, focus on natural beauty or scenery to a much broader concept of landscape character constructed through human perception, and transcending any of its individual elements. Methods, tools and techniques have been developed to give practical meaning to this idea of landscape character.

The two main methods, Landscape Character Assessment (LCA) and Historic Landscape Characterisation (HLC) were applied first in the United Kingdom, but other methods are in use elsewhere in Europe, and beyond, to achieve similar ends. This book explores why different approaches exist, the extent to which disciplinary or cultural specificities in different countries affect approaches to land management and landscape planning, and highlights areas for reciprocal learning and knowledge transfer.

Contributors to the book focus on examples of European countries ? such as Sweden, Turkey and Portugal ? that have adopted and extended UK-style landscape characterisation, but also on countries with their own distinctive approaches that have developed from different conceptual roots, as in Germany, France and the Netherlands. The collection is completed by chapters looking at landscape approaches based on non-European concepts of landscape in North America, Australia and New Zealand.

This book has an introductory price of £125/$205 which will last until 3 months after publication - after this time it will revert to £140/$225.

PART I - CONTEXTS AND STARTING POINTS

1. Landscape Character Approaches in Global, Disciplinary and Policy Context: An Introduction

2. Landscape Character: Experience from Britain

3. Historic Landscape Characterisation: An Archaeological Approach to Landscape Heritage

PART II – ADAPTATION AND EXPANSION

4. Landscape Characterisation in Sweden: Landscape in the Planning System

5.New Approaches for New Regions – Turkey

6. Developing a Landscape Character Map of Cyprus

7. Multi-method Approaches to Cultural Landscape Assessment in Croatia

8. Landscape Character Assessment across Scales: Insights from the Portuguese Experience of Policy and Planning

9. Collaborative, Participatory Process of Landscape Character Mapping for Land and Forest Planning in Zanzibar, Tanzania

PART III – PARALLEL EUROPEAN TRADITIONS

10. US Approaches Related to Landscape Character Assessment

11. Atlas du paysage: Landscape Atlases in France and Wallonia

12. Landscape Assessment in Germany

13. The Landscape Biography Approach to Landscape Characterisation: Dutch Perspectives

PART IV - NON-EUROPEANISED CONCEPUALISATIONS

14. He tangata, he tangata, he tangata: Landscape characterisation in Aotearoa–New Zealand

15. Caring for Country: A New Landscape Paradigm in Australia

16. On Calling Place: Language, Naming and the Understanding of Landscape Character Attributes of Cultural Places in the Asia-Pacific region.

17. Perspectives on Landscape: Some Canadian Approaches

PART V – FUTURE CHALLENGES

18. The Embodied City and Metropolitan Landscape

19. Landscape, Local Knowledge and Democracy: The Work of the Landscape Observatory of Catalonia

20. Conclusion: Seeing Obstacles and Finding Ways Ahead

GrahamFairclough,an archaeologist, worked for many years in English Heritage and is now a member of the McCord Centre for Landscape at Newcastle University, UK.

IngridSarlöv Herlin,landscape architect, is a Professor of Landscape Planning in the Department for Landscape Architecture, Planning and Management of SLU, the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, in Alnarp, Sweden.

Carys Swanwick,a practitioner and an academic, is Emeritus Professor of Landscape at the University of Sheffield,UK, and a part time Technical Director in landscape planning at SLR Consulting.