The upside of global warming
There was a recurring theme in my education that if you approach the landscape as a problem solver, you’ll see nothing but problems — treating the environment as a problem of optimization confuses the role of the landscape architect with that of the value engineer and the cost consultant.
So it would appear to be with global warming. This summer’s drought in the UK has been a boon for aerial archaology. The extremes of temperature and desiccation have increased the importance of microclimate to the point where foundations, berms, and earthworks of all sorts hundreds and thousands of years old interact with contemporary vegetation to reveal traces of the past.
Happily, increased interest in aerial archaeology will mean more flights, which means more greenhouse gas emissions, which means more warming, which means even better aerial archaeology.
The future’s looking so bright, I gotta wear shades…