Projects

Reforesting Fort Ord

An image that includes renderings of trees and verdant landscapes with line drawings of people running, walking, and riding bikes on a road.

Traveling within a fuel break through the proposed remediated and planted landscape of Fort Ord. There are runners, a biking family, a canopy tower in the distance, foresters monitoring a stand of Monterey Pine, and a view of the Salinas Valley.

by Slide Kelly (MLA I AP, MDes ’24)

This thesis examines the potential for the conservation of Monterey pine biodiversity through the active planting of an experimental forest in the Impact Area of Fort Ord: a former US military firing range soon to become part of a national monument. It choreographs a plan for expanded munitions disposal alongside the planting of a human-assisted forest – within which thread a network of field stations, transformed fuel breaks for travel across partially off-limits land, and a redefined porous edge between Fort Ord and the neighboring city of Seaside, California. 

In proposing larger-scale remediation alongside a more-than-native-restoration, this thesis addresses the delicate balance between the passive ecosystem restoration that is status-quo for compromised US public lands and the destructive subsurface remediation needed for any alternative future for Fort Ord. The result is a landscape where once-prohibited neighbors – including Monterey pine – are allowed to arrive, challenging the colonial freeze-frame of what species can be “native” and where.

Reforesting Fort Ord provides a framework for re-connecting communities to locked-up public lands, and envisions how experimental forests, designed landscapes, and collaborative management can cultivate identity and social investment in a newly designated urban national monument. Here is a place once forbidden to people and to pines, where finally there is a possibility for more than preservation.

A map of the world showing the areas where Monterrey pine trees grow. Images of pine trees appear on the map.
A map showing the biogeography of Monterey Pine (pinus radiata) from its native range in North America to its landscape of plantation forestry in the southern hemisphere. Includes an inset map of California, and examples of wild, decorative, and plantation varieties.
A drawing of a Monterey pine tree along with a scientific identification tag for it and a map of its native range in California.
A wild Monterey pine with a tree tag describing its ecology, genetic diversity, and species concern, alongside a northern hemisphere map showing its native range.
A series of drawings showing people working on the land including by digging with excavators and shovels or other tools.
An axonometric drawing describing the difference between surface and subsurface remediation at Fort Ord, California. Includes a flow diagram showing the steps of both processes.
A diagram showing a topographical map as well as information about the area's average climate ranges.
A 3D section showing climate gradient over Fort Ord in the dry season of 2022, including min average temperature, max average temperature, and average precipitation.
A diagram that includes information about an areas biodiversity and climate.
A matrix diagram showing reforestation planting plots across a climate, longitude, and elevation gradient. Plots are split into small medium and large and shown with prevailing aspect and planting strategy.
A diagram showing different elements of the landscape project including planting, field stations, seaside portals, and routes for travel.
The principles of the project, including planting, field stations, fuel break travel and a national monument portal.
A plan for a landscape that includes various kinds of trees and a road.
A diagram showing possible permutations for a forest plot planted with an intensive approach, including formal variations and change over time.
A diagram showing elevations and cut-away views of a structure with an open roof designed to enclose trees.
Diagrams showing a typical field station experimental structure, variations in roof apertures to allow forest growth, and social uses including as rest stations and canopy top lookouts.
A diagram showing different configurations of trees planted along a road.
Framework drawings for improved fuel break travel, including key principles, planting shaded fuel breaks, banking with topography, and trail diversity and duplication.
A black-and-white line drawing of a landscape that includes trees and various open structures resembling huts in which trees are growing.
Layout and diversity of uses within the proposed Seaside Portal national monument village, including structures dedicated to forest support, visitor, and community uses.