Best Practices

Event And Heavy Foot Traffic Management on Turf Grass

The National Mall - America's Front Yard - had been loved to death by tourism, events, and recreation from over 30 million people annually. The Mall’s soils had been compacted which robbed it of pore space for air, water, and roots. The grass that was there since the 1970’s had degraded to a stand of mostly weeds that could survive those compacted conditions. Through decades of lessons learned and research, the National Mall's Turf Management and Event Operations Guide remains one of the best in industry standards for managing heavy foot traffic and events on turf grass. The Appendix also cites the following sources as its sources for creating the guide.

• Best Management Practices Used at Urban Parks in National and International Locations: A Background Report for the National Mall Plan. NPS (March 2007).
• Draft Elms of the Monumental Core History and Management Plan, NPS Natural Resource Report, NPS/NCR/NRR-2009/001.
• Evaluation of the Effects on Turf of Different Terraplas Pitch Protection Systems, Sports Turf Research Institute (July 2010).
• Event Impact Observation Study, HOK (2011).
• NAMA 151515 Specification Section 329219 part 3.11 (2011).
• National Mall Trafficked Turf Systems Report for the National Park Service, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University Department of Crop and Soil Environmental Sciences (Fall 2010).
• NPS NCR Requirements 36 CFR 7.96 (g)
• Report on the National Mall Soil Compaction Evaluation (April 4, 2008).
• Requirements for Special Events Held on Parkland, National Park Service (Version 8-6-07-A).
• Resource Conservation Practice; Understanding and Managing Soil Compaction, Iowa State University (2009).
• Soils of the Mall in Washington, DC, 50 Soil Science Society of America Journal No. 3 (May-June 1986).
• Soil Compaction and Its Effects upon Urban Vegetation, Better Trees for Metropolitan Landscapes Symposium Proceedings, USA Forest Service Tech. Rep. NE-22 (1976).
• Summer 1992 Studies by CUE Confirm Compacted Mall Soils Memo, Center for Urban Ecology (1992).
• The Elms of the National Mall: Studies, Findings and Recommendations. Center for Urban Ecology (August 10, 1993).
• Trial to Evaluate Turf Protection Systems, Sports Turf Institute (2010).

Turf Management in Cultural Landscapes

A few important questions we ask ourselves before we start managing turf in a cultural landscape are:

• how do we want to represent these landscapes to reflect, in large part, the historic character that was there during the preservation period that we've identified for the particular site?

• how can historic preservation research, analysis, and planning can help guide the management of this resources

Overall our goals for managing cultural landscapes include:

• to convey and landscape qualities feeling of primary periods of significance

• to retain the authenticity of historic materials and features
  to be consistent with current use and property management goals

However, we also have to ensure that what we're dong is affordable, sustainable, meets current code requirements, meets accessibility guidelines and that we're providing interpretation, educational, and recreational value where appropriate.

Doing Your Research

To accomplish our future goals, we research the past. We look at research and documentation to really document the physical history and current conditions of a historic site, evaluate authenticity, integrity of that property - how much remains from the historic period - and use that to identify important features that define the historic character of the place. What really makes this place look and feel like it did during the historic period?

Develop a Treatment Plan

With that information we do some treatment planning. We develop treatment plans which guide the implementation of actions that are really needed to effectively convey those qualities of the historic character that we're trying to share with the visiting public for educational and interpretive purposes. And treatment - so, going out and actually caring for the landscape in such a way that it presents those historic qualities, may include the removal of non-significant elements that are there today and the reintroduction or replacement of missing historic features that have been lost over time.