If one looks at physical planning in Sweden today one can see that while talking about densification of existing development, reduced emissions and careful use of important land, urban sprawl is a fact with development of sheer residential districts in the urban edges and shopping malls in each and every municipality. As sustainable development is an essential goal for physical planning to strive towards, it is worth questioning if the direction of today?s planning will lead to the goal. A sustainable development can be seen as an obvious to goal aim at. In reality the aim means a hard and complex work.

The landscape is a great asset for Göteborg as a city and places in the landscape are much used by the public. This diploma work deals with the question of how nature in Göteborg can become more accessible and how a place in it can be supplemented with new landscape elements. It is a proposal for a new urban park at Björlanda peninsula in the western part of Hisingen, Göteborg, which today belongs to the Swedish Armed Forces and is a part of the Nature-2000 area "Nordre älvs estuarium". The reason for choosing this place is that it is the only area around the costal area in Göteborg that has not been built on and that it contains a very varied landscape. The proposal is presented as three different broschures, dated 10-20 years ahead: A map of a possible system of urban parks including a detail of such a park, Västra Hisingen (the western parts of Hisingen) The idea with a system of urban parks is to make the landscape generally more accessible and maybe open it for people that do not use it today. A broschure of the central area Välkommen, with my design proposal for an urban park at Björlanda peninsula The design aims to utilize the landscape elements water, mountains, vegetation and sky and to intensify the experience of them. A flora for Välkommen that shows a selection of plants for the design proposal.

If one looks at physical planning in Sweden today one can see that while talking about densification of existing development, reduced emissions and careful use of important land, urban sprawl is a fact with development of sheer residential districts in the urban edges and shopping malls in each and every municipality. As sustainable development is an essential goal for physical planning to strive towards, it is worth questioning if the direction of today?s planning will lead to the goal. A sustainable development can be seen as an obvious to goal aim at. In reality the aim means a hard and complex work.

If one looks at physical planning in Sweden today one can see that while talking about densification of existing development, reduced emissions and careful use of important land, urban sprawl is a fact with development of sheer residential districts in the urban edges and shopping malls in each and every municipality. As sustainable development is an essential goal for physical planning to strive towards, it is worth questioning if the direction of today?s planning will lead to the goal. A sustainable development can be seen as an obvious to goal aim at. In reality the aim means a hard and complex work.

The major environmental problems that we have today are frequently mentioned in the media today. One example is the ongoing debate regarding global warming and its causes and consequences. There are also several other problems in our society such as segregation and social tensions. Most agree that we must do something to solve these problems and that we must try to achieve a sustainable development for the entire planet. But how should it actually be done and what trade-offs, compromises, sacrifices and changes must be made?The purpose of this paper is to examine how these issues are being dealt with in Swedish city planning.

Vegetation is a much appreciated element in our outdoor environment that has many advantages as well for the climate as for people?s health. However in some types of environments vegetation may be problematic. Especially in urban areas with limited space, solid surfaces, pollutions, and warm and dry climate. In these environments vegetations may have difficulty surviving and moreover it may have a negative impact on the environment around it.

This thesis is covering my design of an architectural object for the use in a pedagogical setting. The purpose is to create contextual premises for students, making possible the testing of designs, involving plants suitable for the urban environment. Hence, the main features in the object design is suggestive to the urban outdoor rooms - rooms that are formed amongst the city facades. The thesis is also about the design process set out from a technical reality, based on camera imagery. To a large extent, the thesis consists of reflections concerning the object's function towards pedagogy, perception and materials. Furthermore, the object claims to be a hybrid between architecture and landscape architecture.

This paper researches how the palimpsest concept is used in relation to landscape, and how it can function as a tool within landscape architecture. Palimpsest originally refers to old parchment handwritings, where new text has been applied on top of effaced, but still discernable, earlier writing. Superimposition of information is the core of the palimpsest concept, used within a range of scientific as well as cultural fields. The purpose of this paper is to find how a landscape palimpsest can be distinguished among the many different layers of landscape, such as historical or cultural, and to examine the potential use of the concept in theory and practice of the landscape architecture field. The study is conducted as a literature survey, examining the use of the palimpsest concept within academic works related to landscape.

In urban planning and design today interventions tend to take place in already existing areas and inevitably effect also surrounding areas. The many parties involved in any change leads to a demand for a shared language around these areas. This thesis aim to, through understanding and communicating a site, Stora Södergatan in Lund Sweden, inspire to a novel way of looking at an urban site preceding design- or planning interventions. Based on a theoretical framework where site is considered as a relational construct, material as well as immaterial, a framework for site thinking is constructed. Further, with theory of representation, the communication of the site is emphasized and accounted for as part of the framework.

The way we design our cities today will affect the living conditions for future generations. Planning as a discipline can become crucial to attain a sustainable urban development with an increased quality of life among the urban population and an improved environment. Urban Agriculture in the Sustainable City -a case study in Managua is a Diploma Work that deal with poverty issues, aspects of sustainability and development work. We have had a theoretical starting-point, but our focus has been on the case study i.e. the practical part, that we carried out in Managua, the capital of Nicaragua. Today about half of the worlds 6,3 billion people live in cities. The demographic growth of the countryside has declined, while the population in the cities is considerably increasing.

Urbanisation has increased the distance between the urban and the rural. Urban agriculture can be a solution to overcome that distance. The characteristic of urban agriculture is the intensive production in intra urban and peri-urban areas. Until 1950s food production in cities was an important part of the urban economy and the urban food supply. Since the 1950s the urban located production of food has almost ceased in Sweden, partly as a result of cheap food imports.

ABSTRACTThis pilot study examines the knowledge about tree root systems amongst five treeplanting professionals. The aim is to find out the professionals? collective knowledge ofthe nature of root systems of various trees used in green areas. Furthermore; to explorehow the professionals adapt landscaped green areas to the tree root properties in asustainable manner. Questions: Which tree species have special root properties toconsider and how do the professionals utilize this knowledge? And: How do theprofessionals in general adjust planting according to the root systems of trees in areas tocreate sustainable green environments?Interviews with the professionals were performed.

Old industrial sites bear witness of the unsustainable industrial developments in the past. Today many of them stand abandoned and empty, old structures lacking function in our present society. We have in this thesis participated in a visionary student competition arranged by IFLA, International Federation of Landscape Architecture by developing a proposal based on a vision of how Stockholm can stimulate a greener development. We have done this by turning an unsustainable industrial site in the city into an ecological node; Arboretum Lövholmen. Our aim is to develop an entry for IFLA?s visionary student competition by creating a new sustainable design for the industrial area of Lövholmen in Stockholm. We have worked with the following research questions: How can we create a visionary design proposal for Lövholmen that promotes sustainable development with the help of ecological design? How can the competition format be a design tool? How can the working process developing a competition entry progress? The competition demands have shaped our working process and functioned as a platform for the structure of this thesis.

The aim of our master thesis is first and foremost to win the competition One Prize - mowing to Growing: Reinventing the American Lawn, announced in USA by the organization Terreform 1, the first of December 2009. Apart from winning the competition we have also tried to reach a deeper understanding of food production today and its future possibilities. Our ambition to present a winning design proposal has to a large extent decided the structure of the entire thesis. Our completed and submitted design proposal - growforgold.org - is a way of addressing urban food production in a creative way, keeping the sovereignty of the individual in mind. Instead of presenting a place-specific design solution our proposal aims to create incentives and possibilities for urban farming to take place anywhere and anytime. Our submission to the competition represents both a tool and a platform which, put in practice, could make landscape architecture happen through the hands of the individual.

The aim of this study is to better understand the Swedish concept of ?förebyggande socialt arbete?, preventive social work. I have conducted eleven qualitative interviews with different key persons and skaters, together with participant observation. During the process of analyzing the material I have used Randall Collins´ concepts of interaction ritual chains together with Jean Laves and Etienne Wengers concept of situated learning. The answers could be split up in three areas, first those who regard prevention work as building good things for the future.