Stephanie Main, Toward a Sustainable Landscape with High Visual Preference and High Ecological Integrity: the Loop Road in Acadia National Park, U.S.A

The Loop Road is one of the most used parks in New England and it has a growing number of visitors. Experiments were performed based on the degradation of the park from the lack of funding and actions to improve the visual preference and ecological integrity. In the late 80s, visitors and residents were asked to participate in an assessment of the park. I thought it was very interesting that near-by residents and visitors were asked to assess the land. Each individual has different backgrounds that influence visual preference. The assessment mainly focused on what the individual saw in this categorized “coastal landscape.” It is interesting that instead of the opinions only coming from the designers, it comes from the outside opinions of the visitors. As Landscape Architects and students we are constantly asking ourselves, what creates a strong visual preference? Part of this assessment asked the visitors to judge areas based off view sheds. This raw data was then translated into tangible ratings. Mathematical equations and calculations are tied together with visitor assessment (I believe this is the linear combination method?). Parks do not always have willing participants to partake in such extensive assessments, and that it is why it is important to assess almost every view of the landscape with a design team made up of more than one person. It is important to collect opinions of those who use the site in order to preserve and protect the “favorite” areas and to not provide views to the unfavorable areas.