ABSTRACT
This chapter highlights two interconnected roles of project-related impact assessment (IA) – the assessment of landscape and visual impacts, and their design implications. It also introduces futures analysis as a variation of IA that is focused upon exploring alternative landscape futures. IA has two critical dimensions. First and foremost, it involves the analysis of the impact or effects of a proposed change upon a given site or location in a landscape. Second, an IA can also analyse the consequences of these impacts for the design of the proposed development. The output of an impact or effects assessment is typically known as an environmental impact assessment (EIA) statement or report, and both the process itself and its outputs (statements) have to meet certain formal standards with regard to content and procedure. Landscape impact-assessment techniques may include different types of landscape analysis, but of particular relevance are value assessment, spatial analysis and site-selection analysis.
