Abstract
Remotely sensed land cover data can be a tremendous resource to land use decision makers, yet there is often a disconnect between the worlds of remote sensing and local government. The Connecticut’s Changing Landscape project is focused on bridging this gap. The project analyzes changes to the state’s landscape using Landsat-derived 30-m land cover and cross-correlation analysis. It includes seven dates spanning 30 years, from 1985 to 2015. During this period an additional 4.7 percent of the state was converted to development-related land covers, with corresponding losses to forest and agricultural land. New development was for the most part in attenuated patterns rather than concentrated near existing developed areas. Additional land cover analyses were conducted of agricultural areas, riparian corridors, core forest, and watershed imperviousness, to more closely examine issues of sustainability. Particular care is taken to make research findings accessible, understandable, and usable for the public through traditional outreach methods, and increasingly through internet mapping technology. As a result, the project has become a widely used resource informing the work of state, regional and local governments, nonprofit organizations, and researchers. A more concerted effort to integrate research and outreach is needed to ensure that land cover research has an impact on issues of land use and sustainability.
Highlights
Land use is an issue that cuts across many scientific disciplines and societal considerations.Among these are human health [1,2], climate change and adaptation [3,4], and the conservation and management of a long list of natural resources, including water, forest, and wildlife habitat [5,6].The science of remote sensing has brought tremendous analytical power to the study of land cover, in which pixels from imagery have been classified to discrete and quantifiable land cover categories.in many cases there remains a disconnect between the global or national scale of land cover data and the more local setting of land use decision making.Land cover data are widely available in the United States
Program was built around the educational power of the land cover data, the data and maps were used within the context of educational presentations to various audiences and were not published on the internet for general consumption
Connecticut is a wealthy state with fairly strong environmental laws but decentralized, locally-driven land use regulation and a dense population
Summary
Land use is an issue that cuts across many scientific disciplines and societal considerations.Among these are human health [1,2], climate change and adaptation [3,4], and the conservation and management of a long list of natural resources, including water, forest, and wildlife habitat [5,6].The science of remote sensing has brought tremendous analytical power to the study of land cover, in which pixels from imagery have been classified to discrete and quantifiable land cover categories.in many cases there remains a disconnect between the global or national scale of land cover data and the more local setting of land use decision making.Land cover data are widely available in the United States. Land use is an issue that cuts across many scientific disciplines and societal considerations. Among these are human health [1,2], climate change and adaptation [3,4], and the conservation and management of a long list of natural resources, including water, forest, and wildlife habitat [5,6]. The science of remote sensing has brought tremendous analytical power to the study of land cover, in which pixels from imagery have been classified to discrete and quantifiable land cover categories. In many cases there remains a disconnect between the global or national scale of land cover data and the more local setting of land use decision making. Land cover data are widely available in the United States.
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