The Landscape Architecture of Lake Chitgar, A Review of Design Process

MSc, Faculty of Architecture and Urban Planning, Shahid Beheshti University
Located in District 22 in west Tehran is the 134 ha Lake Chitgar. Early schemes and planning for the lake date back to 1968, but it was eventually in 2010 that it was placed in the municipality agenda. The design and implementation of the water expanse was complete by 2012, and it was filled a year later. There has been a variety of occasionally contradictory criticisms in academic and professional circles regarding the lake’s location, water supply sources and its environmental impacts: from the designated density of surrounding urban areas to quality and quantity of incoming water and even the city’s ecologic capacity to retain such a lake. Nevertheless, bearing in mind the landscape architects’ disinvolvement from the project’s macroscale decisions, and thereby the negligence of coastal landscape debates, the present paper attempts to pay particular attention to such neglected debates concerning this project. The paper reviews the views and concepts employed in coastal landscape architecture, the most important of which being those of green infrastructures and taking advantage of natural elements. The attention to ecological concept was also considered in order to create a suitable ground for animal life and its growth, and thereby users’ contact and familiarisation with these phenomena with learning and social objectives in mind. It should be noted, however, that the authors believe that authorities’ unfamiliarity with these concepts have contributed in the scheme’s part-failure, and non-implementation of many original ideas. A further level of training is proposed in response, to familiarise authorities as well as the public in order to help mitigate the present situation.