Two ISU projects were recently deemed two of the most environmentally-friendly transportation ideas in the nation.

The projects were chosen from more than 134 nominations from 34 states on April 22 in Washington D.C.

“Iowa State was the only university that received an award. All the other awards were given to either government or private projects,” said Tim Borich, associate professor of community and regional planning. Borich was key to one of the winning programs.

One of the winning projects, Iowa’s Living Roadways, has two components: visioning and projects.

The visioning component provides communities with a population of fewer than 10,000 planning and landscape design assistance. The projects aspect of the program provides funds for communities to plant native grasses, wildflowers, shrubs and trees along transportation corridors.

The second project to receive an Environmental Excellence award was the Aesthetic Initiative Measurement System (AIMS).

“This project is similar to the idea of a mobile-focus group,” Borich said. “We wanted to know what people really see as they drive, what attracts or detracts their attention.”

The project was funded by the Minnesota Department of Transportation and Iowa State.

The highway corridors and landscape treatments of various cities in Minnesota were judged on the aesthetic values of maintenance, plant design, structural design and vistas from the highway.

Nora Ladjahasan, resource associate for the institute for design research and outreach, was in charge of data management.

“The overall conclusion was that the two main aesthetic concerns of the highway landscape were inadequate maintenance and unattractive design aspects within the right-of-way,” Ladjahasan said.

Both Ladjahasan and Mark Anderson-Wilk, who also contributed to drawing conclusions from the study, emphasized AIMS projects’ results correlate with studies done in the past, proving their validity.

“The data can be used by other departments of transportation to improve other urban highway routes and rural highways in the future,” Anderson-Wilk said.

Both projects will receive recognition on June 3 by the Iowa Transportation Commission for their accomplishments.