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Obit> Asa Hanamoto, 1923–2015

Obit> Asa Hanamoto, 1923–2015

Pioneering post-war landscape architect Asa Hanamoto passed away at his home in Mill Valley, California on April 9.

The son of Japanese immigrants, Hanamoto was interned with his family at the Tule Lake War Relocation Center in Northern California during World War II. He then served in the U.S. Army, studied at UC Berkeley, started his career at Eckbo, Royston & Williams, and went on to design public projects including parks, campuses, recreational designs and community plans over a career that lasted more than five decades.

Hanamoto’s firm, RHBA (now called RHAA), blazed a trail for then-nascent fields of environmental and community planning. It is known especially for work on the Willamette River Greenway Study (1975), establishing a vital recreational and scenic corridor along the Oregon river; and the Golden Gate National Recreation Area (1976), assessing and planning the 116-square mile project and establishing management plans that still guide the area. Hanamoto’s biography can be found at the Cultural Landscape Foundation‘s web site.

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