PARENT SESSION
Contributed Oral Session 4: Forest Management
Monday, August 8, 8:00 AM - 11:30 AM, Meeting Room 514 A, Level 5, Palais des congrès de Montréal
Housing growth in and near the National Forests of the conterminous United States.
Radeloff, Volker*,1, Hammer, Roger1, Stewart, Susan2, Flather, Curtis3, Holcomb, Sherry1, McKeefry, Jason1, 1 University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison2 USDA Forest Service, North-Central Research Station, Evanston3 USDA Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station, Fort Collins
ABSTRACT- Public lands such as National Forests play an important role in biodiversity conservation because of their relative lack of human development. However, if National Forests become islands in a sea of strongly human dominated landscapes, if corridors connecting National Forests are lost, then they may no longer function effectively as species refugia. Recent housing growth trends in the U.S., especially the rampant development of high-amenity rural areas, thus raise concerns for forest managers and conservation biologists. The goal of this study was to quantify housing densities and housing growth rates from 1940 to 2000 in and near National Forest (1, 5, 10, 15, and 50km buffers) across the conterminous Unites States. Housing units can be common within the administrative boundaries of a National Forest due to private property inholdings. Our results show substantial numbers of housing units in and near National Forests. For example, 43% of the area of the Huron Manistee NF and 25% of the Mark Twain NF contained > 6.17 housing units per km2 (140 acres). The vast majority of the houses (80 and 61% respectively) are located in the Wildland Urban Interface, densely developed areas that are either within 1.5 miles of a large area of contiguous wildland vegetation or areas with scattered housing that directly intermingle with wildland vegetation. Rural housing growth rates were particularly high in the 1970s and 1990s. These results underscore the significance of current development trends in the U.S. and the serious management challenges they pose to National Forests, potentially impeding their important function for conservation.
Key words: conservation, sprawl, fragmentation, public land