Where the Rivers Were: Connecting Indigenous Blue Space to Contemporary City Design

Urban blue space refers to any visible water body within a city, including manmade ponds and fountains, as well as natural lakes, wetlands and rivers. Contemporary efforts have aimed to reconnect blue spaces into city design. This might be best accomplished by mapping indigenous (or relict) hydrologic features and connecting blue space to green space (city parks). This chapter focuses on six major cities in the USA to evaluate the spatial extent of urban stream burial within the last century, the percent of indigenous stream network that is still a part of the modern stream network and the innate relationship between city parks and urban blue space. The results show variation in extent of stream burial since 1900—from no net loss (Minneapolis) to 89% (Detroit). Some cities have maintained larger parts of the relict stream network than others (e.g., Philadelphia has 90% of modern channels classified as relics, while Richmond has only 74%). City parks have played a valuable role as protectors of urban streams. The relationship between urban green space and blue space is unique, as city parks typically safeguard urban water features that are otherwise vulnerable to removal due to urban development.