About Cleveland's famous "Emerald Necklace"
Cleveland
has a 21,000 acre(8093 ha)
world class urban park
system that winds it's way continuously over 125 miles(201km) across the sprawling
Cleveland region.
This "Emerald Necklace", as it's
known today, is largely the creation of the
city beautiful movement
during the early 20th century in the US.
The"Necklace" is comprised
of 16 gemstones or large
metropolitan parks of climax forests graced by silver beech, hemlock and maple
and connected
by a 125 mile forest parkway that is a great
pleasure in itself to
explore.
Besides
being the lungs of the region this
marvelous green giant provides many resources to the community that include:
-----6 championship golf courses with unmatched food and beverage service,
several of which I spent a lot of design time with
-----230 miles of multitrail networks thru pristine forests--offering horseback
riding--biking--jogging/power walking. What I learned from the complex regional multitrail
studies with metro was to be invaluable in planning an even much larger regional
multitrail network for the Canberra region that connected to the Australian
trail grid.
-----One of the best zoos in the country that introduced amazingly life like shotcrete animal enclosures for big cats and primates. See my design below for
this great idea.
-----8 natural history museums that creatively tell the enchanting story of the
forest and all who live in it and why it's such a precious asset that must
be
protected I was very involved in the site planning and interior layout for
several of these valuable community assets while at metro. I worked extensively
with Zaret Kelly,
the noted industrial designer, in creating concepts for the new audio assisted
dioramas in the Rocky River museum project..
beech, hemlock forests
enchanting old castles
golf courses a winters tale for sure in north chagrin
metropark
toboggan slides miles of hiking trails rocky river metropark meets lake erie many shale waterfalls
Master Plan For The Cleveland Zoo
I had the privilege to work for this great
organization and help prepare it's plans, many of which are reality today. By
way of example, one of the most
rewarding of these efforts was the creation of a master plan for the zoo not
long after it was relocated in to it's current 165 acre site within MetroParks.
With over 1.5 million
visitors a year, the
Cleveland MetroZoo
is one of the country's busiest .Creative zoo design
is one of the most challenging environments
a
landscape architect can find him/her self involved with.
Incessant technological innovations demand that any
long term zoo planning and design be
very flexible
with lots of room for expansion. I include one of many studies that I,
zoologists and engineers designed and built for the
cat enclosures
that used the then
evolving tech of faux rock creation using
color butal/isoprene compounds applied over reinforced shotcrete shells.
Correctly designed
and built this technique is
very effective in displaying cats
in a most realistic setting that give the animals maximum comfort as well.
(No easy feat in
a climate as demanding as
Cleveland's winters.
Master Plan with one of many
studies done for the then new cat enclosures that were on the drawing boards
along with many other projects vying for attention.
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Final Cat Enclosure Study for shotcrete
documentation package 50-9B
KEY MAP
1-AMPHITHEATRE FOR OUTDOOR THEATRE, CONCERTS, EVENTS, ETC
2-PRIMATE CENTER AND LARGE CATS-GORILLAS-CHIMPS AND MONKEYS
3-CLEVELAND ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY HEADQUARTERS
4-RECREATION AREA --BALL FIELDS
5-NORTHERN TREK COMPLEX FOR COLDER CLIMATE FAUNA (BEARS-SEALS-WOLVES-ETC)
6-CENTER FOR ZOOLOGICAL MEDICINE
7-VISITOR PARKING
8-MAIN ENTRANCE --RAINFOREST
9-ADMIN-LEARNING CENTER
10-PARROTS, EAGLES, HAWKS, TROPICAL BIRDS
11-WATERFOWL LAKE--FOUNTAINS
12-BIG CREEK ESCARPMENT
14-AUSTRALIAN ADVENTURE
15-WADE HALL
16-RHINO
17-DINOSAURS
18-KOALAS
19- ELEPHANTS
20-GIBBONS
21-FALLS
22-FLIGHT CAGE
23-AFRICAN SAVANNA
A 2007 aerial of the Cleveland Zoo
reveals that the original Master Plan has been added to but remains essentially
the same as I designed it.
The large road
crossing the park near the center is the new Fulton Road bridge over Big Creek.
On the top of the Big Creek escarpment at the bottom of the
aerial you can see
the primate building, the amphitheatre and the zoological society . At the bottom of
the escarpment is the greater portion of the complex,
including most of the
visitor parking.
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kent mccoy landscape architect
www.kentmccoy.com email
kentmccoy40@gmail.com