Endless Summer: Managing Character in Coastal Communities: Fid-Bau Portal

Endless Summer: Managing Character in Coastal Communities

These proceedings present essays and workshop session notes from a three-day conference held in October 2004, entitled Endless Summer: Managing Character in Coastal Communities. The event brought together over 120 community members and people from across the country including public agency representatives, members of non-profit organizations, academics, government leaders, members of the business community, and interested citizens. The intent of the conference was to engage coastal resource stewards and local community members in thought-provoking analysis and discussion of key issues threatening the character of the Outer Cape. All participants were encouraged to share their own experiences and learn about different approaches to planning and conservation of community character in coastal regions. The idea of holding a conference originated in 2002 as part of a larger initiative funded by the National Park Service. The conference followed a study carried out by the University of Massachusetts on the landscape character of the Outer Cape. Two groups of graduate students and faculty from the Department of Landscape Architecture and Planning and the Department of History conducted an intensive study of the character-defining places of the Outer Cape and invited public involvement. The resulting study, People and Places of the Outer Cape: A Landscape Character Study, has received awards from the Environmental Design and Research Association and the Boston Society of Landscape Architects.