Asakura Robinson provided full landscape architecture and urban design services through construction for capital improvements to four major corridors in the City of Austin, including (1) North Lamar Boulevard; (2) South Lamar Boulevard; (3) East Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard/FM 969; and (4) East Riverside Drive.
Asakura Robinson, with support from its engineer teams, produced large-scale Placemaking Opportunity Reports for each of the four corridors. These reports identified Gateways, Districts, and Nodes, and provided locations, implementation strategies, partnership opportunities, and estimates of probable cost for all placemaking elements within these opportunity areas.
As part of a larger effort of the City of Austin to make capital improvements on nine major corridors, Asakura Robinson made design recommendations that considered the existing and future developments along four of the city’s corridors. These recommendations included concepts that celebrated existing business districts, supported new tactical business enterprises (ex. food trucks), and connected placemaking elements to future transportation development and existing bikeways and public parks.
Asakura Robinson worked closely with the City of Austin staff in multiple departments to build off of the City’s Placemaking Toolkit and identified engagement opportunities for art, green infrastructure, and cultural and historical touchstones. The project team created a GIS tool for the city to use and expanded on that to show different placemaking recommendations in an actual corridor model.
Asakura Robinson Company provided urban design and landscape architecture services to the City of Austin as they worked to improve the city’s major corridors. In 2016, voters approved a bond that included capital improvements on major corridors throughout the city. Asakura Robinson worked with various engineering leads on four of the corridors during the Preliminary Engineering Report (PER) phase. These corridors included North Lamar Boulevard, South Lamar Boulevard, East Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard/FM 969, and East Riverside Drive. During the PER phase, the firm focused on developing large-scale Placemaking Opportunity Reports for each of the four corridors. Asakura Robinson’s placemaking report provided locations, implementation strategies, partnership opportunities, and estimates of probable cost for all placemaking elements within these opportunity areas. Placemaking recommendations for these reports ranged from locations for green infrastructure (South Lamar Blvd. Corridor) to the locations of key Nodes (North Lamar Blvd Corridor).
The project team was innovative in its approach in combining capital improvement projects with large-scale placemaking elements for the four corridors. Asakura Robinson took into account existing conditions and future development for land use, economic development, and transportation. The team worked closely with the City of Austin staff in multiple departments to build off of the City’s Placemaking Toolkit and engage opportunities for art, green infrastructure, cultural and historical touchstones, plazas and gathering spaces, and identifying materials and site furnishings.
Asakura Robinson is still involved with the project and doing full landscape design through construction for the corridors. Along with the Placemaking Opportunity Reports, the firm also created a GIS tool for the city to use and expand on that shows different placemaking recommendations in an actual corridor model.
