Jack Ahern
Professor Emeritus of Landscape Architecture
Professor Jack Ahern, FASLA retired at the end of the Spring 2020 semester after 34 years in LARP at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Jack was the very model of a modern landscape architect, rooted in sustainable design with a passion for plants, landscape ecology, greenway planning, and ecosystem services. He had a positive influence on the thousands of students who took his classes and the ones whom he mentored. There are so many aspects of the landscape architecture program that bear his imprint that it’s impossible to innumerate them all.
Before coming to UMass in 1986, Jack was a registered landscape architect who worked with John Rahenkamp & Associates and also Wallace, Roberts & Todd, both in Philadelphia, PA. He collaborated with Emeritus Professors Mark Lindhult and John Mullen on the award-winning master plan for the UMass Amherst Campus in 1993. The most significant result was a policy for the campus to focus on infill development in the campus core in order to create a more pedestrian friendly environment, reduce travel time, centralize infrastructure, define public spaces and preserve the rural context.