The Open Space Assessment Tool (OSAT) is a collaborative effort to integrate and elevate the many activities underway to conserve and enhance the ecological, economic, recreational, and aesthetic vitality of the Central Puget Sound region.
he Regional Open Space Strategy (ROSS) is a collaborative effort led by landscape architects and planners to integrate and elevate the many activities underway to conserve and enhance the ecological, economic, and cultural vitality of the Central Puget Sound region. With a collective, integrated vision and coordinated system, planners and decision-makers will be able to consider actions in light of their regional significance and priority, potentially drawing greater investment to the region’s infrastructure, and more efficiently use available resources. Accounting for the full values that open spaces yield will recognize multi-benefit potential and inform landscape planning and investment.
By identifying these services and benefits at the parcel by parcel to regional basis, it informs open space conservation, enhancement and protection priorities in the region. Driven by a multi-benefit, ecosystem services approach and with a lens to account for the full spectrum of open space benefits, the tool provides a baseline for 16 key services that flow from open spaces such as farmland, forests, aquatic systems, urban parks and even regional trails.