The analysis and design of urban wetland: The Water Garden in Portland and Living Water Park in Chengdu as case studies

Abstract

Problems caused by urbanization, such as inadequate water content in the urban foundation, ecological imbalance in the soil and the heat island effect, have become issues that people pay a great amount of attention to. Two projects, cited as being successful in integrating urban landscape planning and wetland ecology, are the Water Garden in Portland, USA, and the Living Water Garden in Chengdu, China. An artificial wetland is effective in establishing urban ecology. It may not only solve the problem of the urban water crisis, but also brings a series of good eco-environmental effects, such as the conservation of groundwater, regulation of climate, extending green areas, purifying the air, beautifying a city, and even effectively controlling flood damage, etc. © 2010 WIT Press.