Rancho Viejo Streetscape

Santa Fe, New Mexico

Client: Rancho Viejo de Santa Fe, Inc.

Great communities are created by attention to detail. At Rancho Viejo, Design Workshop has created streetscapes that harvest water, reduce irrigation and provide great walking environments. The design of the Rancho Viejo communities was inspired by the surrounding native landscape and the pedestrian-friendly street sections. At Rancho Viejo, the streets are designed with planting parkways, which create comfortable walking zones separate from traffic. The parkways are planted with colorful native perennials and seasonally blooming shrubs. To support a sustainable environment at Rancho Viejo, irrigation systems are designed only to help the new plants become established and will be phased out over a four-year cycle, as the plants mature. Through the use of meandering swales, stone riffles and water capturing tree wells, the parkways also incorporate water harvesting techniques to maximize use of the region’s sparse amount of rainfall.