Final review for UC Berkeley Landscape Architecture 200, Fundamentals of Landscape Design (Modalities of the Urban Landscape); instructors: Richard Hindle & Tomas McKay.
before/after studies
schematic plan, section, perspective
site context
Channel Park today: limited pedestrian access, but vast connectivity by air and by water. 
The southern edge abuts a forthcoming development site for the Brooklyn Basin project, and the Fifth Avenue Marina… 
…and promises future connections to a contiguous Bay Trail. Opportunities for water access surround the site, including this cove on the southern point… 
…which looks across the Alameda Channel to the marina and beyond. 
Meanwhile, up the Lake Merritt tidal channel just below the control structure, natural ebbs and flows support a narrow pickleweed marsh edge. 
This waterway is crossed by a maze of infrastructure including the I-880 Nimitz Freeway, an abandoned railway grade, the modern Union Pacific/Amtrak line, sewer infrastructure, and the Embarcadero street crossing. 
Beneath the freeway, it is quiet. Light reflects from the water onto the shadowed underside of the overpass… 
…and Lake Merritt’s resident Muscovy ducks take refuge, though human connection to the bayshore is blocked. 
The infrastructure barriers end here, south of the Embarcadero crossing, where the Lake Merritt Channel tidal flow meets Alameda Channel and the Bay. 
Across the channel opening, people take to the water from the Jack London Aquatic Center on rowboats and kayaks, and crew teams on their long racing sculls. 
During calm weather, surrounding peninsulas protect the cove from wave action, making an ideal environment for small craft… 
…with Channel Park only a short 300-foot crossing away.
geomorphology and deep section
tidal wetland salinity/zonation
