• Journal of the Korean Institute of Landscape Architecture
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• v.40 no.5
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• pp.8-18
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• 2012

Urban nature plays an important role not only in the improvement of the physical environment but also from the perspective of psychological and social function. In particular, schoolyards as well as the green spaces near school surroundings function as a primary space for urban children to experience nature in Korea, as they spend most of their time at school. In this study, the status of urban green spaces near school surroundings was examined. For the analysis, 185 elementary schools in Seoul were selected and the green spaces within a radius of 300m(defined as 'school zone' in this study) were analyzed using the Rapid Eye multispectral satellite image data. The mean green space ratio of school zone accounts to about 21% with a high variation from 74% to 0.7% and more than half of the school zone have a green space ratio of less than 20%. Schools with a high green space ratio in their school zone are mostly located near urban forests, so forest areas particularly contribute to increase the green space ratio. Furthermore, forest vegetation shows relatively higher vitality than other green spaces located in urbanized areas. In contrast, schools with a low green space ratio in their school zone are mostly situated in high-density residential areas and the green spaces show relatively low vegetation vitality. Except for the urban forest, the majority of urban green spaces in urbanized areas are landscape green facilities in apartment districts. The other types of urban open spaces such as environmentally shaped schoolyards or street parks account only for a very small proportion of school surroundings. Therefore, it is needed to establish countermeasures in the context of urban planning; e.g. to promote the school forest projects preferentially by selecting schools with a extremely low green space ratio in their school zone, to foster roof greening in near surroundings, and to connect schoolyards organically with nearby apartment landscape green facilities as an easily accessible urban open space.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Landscape Architecture
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• v.43 no.2
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• pp.1-12
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• 2015

This study explores urban gardening and garden culture in residential area as an everydayness that has been overlooked during the modern period urbanization and investigates the meaning and value of urban gardening from the perspective of urban formations and growth in spontaneous urban residential area, Haebangchon. The result identified that urban gardening as a meaning of contemporary culture is a new clue to improving the urban physical environment and changing the lives and community network of residents. Haebangchon is one of the few remaining spontaneous habitations in Seoul, and was created as a temporary unlicensed shantytown in 1940s. It became the representative habitation for common people in downtown Seoul through the revitalization of the 60s and the local reform through self-sustaining redevelopment projects during the 70s through the 90s. This area still contains the image of times during the 50s to the 60s, the 70s to the 80s and present, with the percentage of long-term stay residents high. Within this context, the site is divided into third quarters, and the research undertaken by observation and investigation to determine characteristics of urban gardening as an everydayness. It can be said that urban gardening and garden culture in Haebangchon is a unique location culture that has accumulated in the crevices of the physical condition and culture of life. These places are an expression of resident's desires that seeking out nature and gardening as revealed in densely-populated areas and the grounds of practical acting and participating in care and cultivation. It forms a unique, indigenous local landscape as an accumulation of everyday life of residents. Urban gardens in detached home has retained the original function of the dwelling and the garden, or 'madang', and takes on the characteristic of public space through the sharing of a public nature as well as semi-private spatial characteristic. Also, urban gardens including small kitchen garden and flowerpots that appear in the narrow streets provide pleasure as a part of nature that blossoms in narrow alley and functions as a public garden for exchanging with neighbors by sharing produce. This paper provides the concept of redefining the relationship between the private-public area that occurs between outside spaces that are cut off in a modern city.

• Korean Journal of Heritage: History & Science
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• v.47 no.2
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• pp.86-113
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• 2014

This study has researched the characteristics and elements of Chwibyeong (翠屛), a sort of trellis in the Joseon Dynasty through the old documents, and the original form of Chwibyeong at Juhapru (宙合樓) in Changdeuk Palace. The results were as follow. First, as the result of literatures analysis for Imwon-gyeongje-ji (林園經濟志) and Jeungbo-sallim-gyeongje (增補山林經濟), the plant screen was classified as kinds of support[frame] material, plants and methods of planting. It was found that the supports of Chwibyeong were made of bamboo or the material such as the Jinjangmok (眞長木: a stick of oak) and Giryu (杞柳: Salix purpurea var. japonica). The evergreen coniferous trees including Pinus densiflora, Taxus cuspidata and Thuja orientalis were mainly used for the plant material of Chwibyeong. The general planting method of Chwibyeong was to plant on the ground, but sometimes the container planting was also found on the artificial ground. Second, the term of 'Chwibyeong' in the literatures was used in only the screen made by evergreen trees, and the superordinate category term of it was indicated by 'byeong (屛)'. Therefore Chwibyeong was a compound word formed from 'chwi (翠)' which means the characteristics of evergreen and 'byeong' as tree screen which the support was made by bamboo. And Chwibyeong had semantic context which was combined with the literary symbolization to describe a landscape of green peak and Taoist ideology be inherent from 'twelve peaks of Musan[巫山十二峰]' in Sichuan sheng (四川省). Thirdly, the photograph of Chwibyeong at Juhapru taken by the 1880s, showed that Chwibyeong was made with coniferous trees and was almost 2 meters high. The Chwibyeong at Juhapru was removed during the Japanese colonial era, but a few yew trees(Taxus cuspidata) used for Chwibyeong are still remaining. And some Juniperus chinensis which the composition time is unclear, were cultivated while hung loose its branchs at the sides of Eosumun (魚水門). This Junipers were presumed to be planted by Japanese after Japanese annexation of Korea(1910), and it was judged that both of the roofs of Eosumun's side gates might have been transformed into Japanese style at the same time. Lastly, Chwibyeong at Juhapru was restored in 2008 but it was restored in wrong way from original form without precise research. Especially Chwibyeong was restored with Sasa boreralis which is damaged by frost, so it requires exertion that should revive the originals to plant original material as much as possible. And it needs the development of fabrication technique for Chwibyeong and the application to current landscape architecture.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Landscape Architecture
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• v.51 no.2
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• pp.42-53
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• 2023

This paper explores the recent development of environmental aesthetics and critically examines the main agendas, claims, issues, and implications of everyday aesthetics, which is emerging as an important branch of environmental aesthetics. Environmental aesthetics began in the context of cultural change and environmentalism in the 1960s and expanded in the second half of the 20th century with a solid theoretical foundation. At the beginning of the 21st century, it entered a process of diversification of objects and subjects. Having reached academic maturity, environmental aesthetics has expanded into theoretical territory considering the urban environment and the human environment, providing practical coordinates as a discourse for planning and designing urban environments and landscapes. The most notable achievement of environmental aesthetics since the mid-2000s is the establishment of 'everyday aesthetics'. Yuriko Saito, who is leading the research on everyday aesthetics, expanded the objects and scope of aesthetic theory to everyday objects, events, activities, and environments. She excavates the microscopic and sensory aspects of everyday life, which have been overlooked by conventional art-centered aesthetics, through the lens of aesthetics. She reinterprets various layers of phenomena in contemporary urban landscapes and analyzes how the 'power of the aesthetic' hidden in everyday life profoundly affects the quality of life and the state of the world. Saito examines the appreciation of the distinctive characteristics and ambiance inherent in everyday objects and environments and proposes a 'moral-aesthetic judgment' to alert citizens to the environmental, social, and political consequences of everyday aesthetic appreciation and response. This paper identifies the issues and implications of everyday aesthetics as first, the expansion of aesthetics and the ambiguous everyday, second, the moral-aesthetic judgment and the aesthetics of care, and third, urban regeneration landscapes and aesthetic literacy. In particular, the moral virtues of everyday aesthetics that Saito proposes, such as care, thoughtfulness, sensitivity, and respect, provide a critical reference for the practice of contemporary urban regeneration landscapes. The 'aesthetic literacy' is a key concept demonstrating why an environmental aesthetics perspective is necessary to interpret everyday urban environments and landscapes.

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.29 no.5
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• pp.363-376
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• 2020

Various policies and institutional efforts are being made for mature democracy and more sustainable administration of our society. In this respect, the importance of civic participation, considered essential in environmental impact assessment, has been consistently emphasized in the relevant theories and practices. Although various methods and forms of public participation are taking place in Korea, criticism is widely understood that collecting citizens' opinions in the decision-making process has become ineffective and formal. Starting from these issues, this paper seeks to learn lessons from the foreign cases in the international context. Extensive literature review was conducted to examine the meaning and objectives of public participation in EIA and the tactical principles. Based on this, the participatory systems and procedures in the United States, Britain, Germany, Japan, and Canada were critically reviewed, and the implications were derived through specific cases. The results are, first, the provision of specific public participation guidelines, second, the securing of transparency in the decision-making process, third, the expansion of procedural participation levels, and lastly, the guarantee of participation opportunities. This paper is meaningful as a basic study to enrich discussions on public participation in the domestic EIA hoping to help research through more diverse empirical cases in the future.

• Korean Journal of Agricultural and Forest Meteorology
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.157-168
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• 2014

From a complex systems perspective, ecohydrological systems in forests may be characterized with (1) large networks of components which give rise to complex collective behaviors, (2) sophisticated information processing, and (3) adaptation through self-organization and learning processes. In order to demonstrate such characteristics, we applied the recently proposed 'process networks' approach to a temperate deciduous forest in Gwangneung National Arboretum in Korea. The process network analysis clearly delineated the forest ecohydrological systems as the hierarchical networks of information flows and feedback loops with various time scales among different variables. Several subsystems were identified such as synoptic subsystem (SS), atmospheric boundary layer subsystem (ABLS), biophysical subsystem (BPS), and biophysicochemical subsystem (BPCS). These subsystems were assembled/disassembled through the couplings/decouplings of feedback loops to form/deform newly aggregated subsystems (e.g., regional subsystem) - an evidence for self-organizing processes of a complex system. Our results imply that, despite natural and human disturbances, ecosystems grow and develop through self-organization while maintaining dynamic equilibrium, thereby continuously adapting to environmental changes. Ecosystem integrity is preserved when the system's self-organizing processes are preserved, something that happens naturally if we maintain the context for self-organization. From this perspective, the process networks approach makes sense.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Landscape Architecture
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• v.41 no.4
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• pp.85-101
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• 2013

The primary goal of this research is to link two currently disconnected literature; the history of urban redevelopment and the one of urban parks and open spaces in the United States (US). Through this exercise, this study attempts to reveal examples of urban parks and open spaces that have yielded economic effects, and emphasize their possibility as a measure of urban redevelopment. Five phases are presented, starting with two Pre-World War II urbanization periods, and three subsequent periods of Post-World War II urban redevelopment (1940s~1960s, late 1960s~1970s, 1980s~present). While urban parks in the 19th century urbanization period held a preeminent place in urban design, policy and economy, ensuing depression and World War II diminished their role as a channel to ease unemployment. In the first phase of urban redevelopment, the economic motive to build open space was to boost the appeal of specific locales in order to draw people and businesses back to a neglected city. In the second phase, public effort to create and maintain urban parks and open spaces declined due to the budget austerity, instead, community open spaces flourished through the voluntary actions and helped neighborhoods to regain desirability. In the third phase, the aspirations and functions of such projects resemble their forerunners of the first phase, but their targets extended to global businesses and elites.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Environmental Restoration Technology
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.215-233
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• 2014

Seoul is an ancient city with a long history but there is hesitancy over referring to as a historic city due to the lack of traceable historic urban landscape elements which resulted from numerous invasions and general destruction. From a diachronic perspective, the nature which was survived the influence of development, could be the key element that links the past with the city's radically changed image in modern times. Although "old big trees" may be not a dominant influence with regards to the historical authenticity of the city, they are objects which contribute towards the historical authenticity by providing a sense of place in terms of connected narratives, as well as their natural image. However, the protection policy for an "old big tree" would place too much emphasis on the aspect of the ecological value rather than its cultural value. Generally, trees have been protected by installing a fence and a signboard around them as well as receiving additional care. However, it is difficult to find that surrounding space around the "law-protected tree" is connected with its original historical and cultural values. Even though the space around trees are no longer utilized in the same way as was so in the past, they still have high-potential in terms of cultural utilization. Therefore, the subject of this study is the "old big tree" as a natural object which contributed to the historical authenticity of Seoul. The current status of these "old big trees", aged between 100 and 800 years old, currently indicate that there are 215 trees designated as "law-protected tree" by the Seoul metropolitan government. This study aims to investigate the status of protection and utilization of the existing "law-protected trees" in the city of Seoul and find a way to increase both ecological preservation and cultural utilization for the high-potential "law-protected trees" within the city itself. In order to achieve this, previously researched papers shall be reviewed and surveyed pertaining to present usage patterns of the 215 "law-protected trees". In addition, five cases have been reviewed which focus on a few of utilizing the "protected trees" and their surrounding spaces. The results of the research indicate that 21 "old big trees" have high-potential in terms of cultural utilization as well as ecological value. However, it was revealed that there are limitations to pursue the value of preservation and utilization simultaneously throughout current regimental management. In order to cope with the current situation, it is pointed out that management facilities should be designed and installed by creative and flexible methods of organizing with consideration to the surrounding space and context. Even though in the case where there may not be a connecting history or legendary stories, the "old big trees" can serve as the fundamental features of small scale parks -dependent on their location, condition and environment- which will be of value to the local communities. This study could serve as a practical reference for the management and utilization of "old big trees" nationwide with numbers reaching 12,300 besides the city of Seoul.

• Journal of Environmental Impact Assessment
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• v.28 no.1
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• pp.23-34
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• 2019

Global warming becomes a serious issue that poses subsidiary issues like a sea level rise or a capricious climate over the world. Because of severe heat-wave of the summer in Korea in 2016, a big attention has been focused on urban heat island since then. Not just about heat-wave itself, many researches have been concentrated on how to adapt in this trendy warming climate and weather in a small scope. A big part of existing studies is mitigating "Urban Heat Island effect" and that is because of huge impervious surface in urban area where highly populated areas do diverse activities. It is a serious problem that this thermal context has a high possibility causing mortality by heat vulnerability. However, there have been many articles of a green infrastructures' cooling impact in summer. This research pays attention to measure cooling effect of a street planting considering urban canyon and type of green infrastructures in neighborhood scale. This quantitative approach was proceeded by ENVI-met simulation with a spatial scope of a commercial block in Seoul, Korea. We found the dense double-row planting is more sensitive to change in temperature than that of the single-row. Among the double-row planting scenarios, shrubs which have narrow space between the plant and the land surface were found to store heat inside during the daytime and prevent emitting heat so as to have a higher temperature at night. The quantifying an amount of vegetated spaces' cooling effect research is expected to contribute to a study of the cost and benefit for the planting scenarios' assessment in the future.

• Journal of People, Plants, and Environment
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.403-413
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• 2021

Background and objective: There is growing concern about the effects of modern society on mental health, coming with Covid-19-related caveats on depression, anxiety, and stress (DAS). This can be a subject to provide alternative methods which alleviate DAS. In line with this context, sensory gardens are widely acknowledged to stimulate the five major senses (sight, sound, taste, touch, and smell) and can have a significant (positive) impact on mental health. However, there is limited empirical evidence on the effect of these gardens with regard to alleviating DAS - particularly with respect to urban society This is a gab in knowledge how such limits can be addressed. Accordingly, this present study is clearly needed in order to verify if there are any correlations between sensory gardens and (positive) effects on DAS. The aim of this study was therefore to understand current levels of DAS in a high density building with a sensory garden in a courtyard and determine correlations between experiences in the sensory courtyard and levels of DAS. Methods: The Depression Anxiety and Stress Scale (DASS-21) was employed to test the level of DAS. Results: Additionally, 13 different factors associated with experiences in the building, including the stimulation of the five major senses in the sensory courtyard, were measured to reveal their contribution to mitigating depression, anxiety, and stress. It is noted that the average levels of DAS were 7.91, 7.77 and 9.01 respectively indicating that the mental health of participants requires mental health management. However, results show that factors associated with the sensory courtyard could improve mental health. For example, new social relationships, walking with colleagues, and the stimulation of each of the five major senses in the sensory garden could improve DAS. Conclusion: This illustrates that external experiences are more effective at mitigating depression, anxiety, and stress than internal ones. Factor analysis revealed four components: stimulating the five senses; internal and external facilities; internet-based device use; and new social relationships. There was a strong positive correlation between new social relationships and walking with colleagues. There were also strong positive correlations among the stimulation of each of the five senses. In conclusion, there are strong indications that sensory courtyards can help alleviate DAS and should therefore be promoted, particularly in the current Covid-19 situation wherein the physical and mental health of the public at large are threatened. Accordingly, courtyard design should be rethought in light of the relationship between the positive impact of sensory gardens and mental health.