From 2006 to 2009 I was privileged to work on the design of a new campus for the Aga Khan University, a proposed new Faculty of Arts and Sciences outside of Karachi, Pakistan.

First impressions of the proposed AKU-FAS site, a desert basin within the Indus River watershed, were of a flat, scrubby desert landscape marked by scattered hedgerows and dirt tracks, a modest oasis, and depleted and abandoned agricultural lands. Rainfall in the region averages 7 inches per year or less—this the same average that Phoenix, Arizona, receives.

In this landscape, the AKU masterplan called for over 30 hectares of open space, an area equal in size to the Boston Common and the Public Garden combined, to be preserved and restored as a desert arboretum. The large majority of its area will not receive ongoing irrigation.

What were the possibilities under these conditions? Our goals for this area were complex, but many could be synthesized under the umbrella term of ecological restoration.

In the Americas, ecological restoration often refers to the concept of restoring a pristine, pre-European-settlement state to the land.  However, the Indus River Basin is one of the oldest continuously occupied regions in the world, and little is known about pre-settlement conditions. Ecological restoration, in this case, refers to a restoration of ecological function, a increasing measure of biodiversity, and the establishment of a landscape which can maintain its own dynamic balance of water, nutrients, and life, without artificial inputs of resources. 

For our site, this meant setting up a system which can provide outdoor amenities and habitat with little or no supplemental water through years-long drought, to connect the university community to its natural environment in the Sindh desert, and safely harness rainfall events which are often torrential and destructive when they do occur.

(site photo of existing bund)

Local farmers traditionally captured rainfall with long linear earthforms called bunds, which are legible in the satellite photo as lighter-colored marks on the land, enabling a higher concentration of vegetation in the catchment areas upslope of the bunds. Grading along the new campus roads will draw on the vocabulary of the bunds as a means of defining catchment areas.

To store the largest volumes of stormwater during a major rainfall event, a series of gently sloping basins were planned to be excavated in conjunction with the bunds. This orchestrated interruption of the rush of storm water will allow fines and debris to settle, and water to concentrate and enable plant life, while preventing flooding of occupied areas. The goal was for all rainfall within the campus watershed to be captured for use and/or infiltration, with no water to leave the campus watershed.

The successful establishment of vegetation plays a key functional role. Desert-adapted species, strategically planted, reduce soil erosion, encourage infiltration, reduce salinization, foster accumulation of organic matter, provide habitat for wildlife, and improve the aesthetics of the campus environment.

(tiger brush)

Here, we are drawing on the patterns that develop naturally in resource-poor environments where a principle of occasional concentration is the rule: bands of denser vegetation form perpendicular to the flow of water, alternated with zone of sparser vegetation, stony or crusted bare earth.

The final site design will build on the principles of the bund, the naturalized basin, and banded vegetation and adapt them to the existing contours, and to the new University’s educational mission, functioning as a model of sustainable development for the region.

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(pdf of site section of typical basin)