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Assessment of Change in Green Infrastructure Components Using Morphological Spatial Pattern Analysis for the Conterminous United States
Citation:
WICKHAM, J. D., K. H. Riitters, T. G. WADE, AND P. Vogt. Assessment of Change in Green Infrastructure Components Using Morphological Spatial Pattern Analysis for the Conterminous United States. Presented at INTECOL, Brisbane, AUSTRALIA, August 16 - 21, 2009.
Impact/Purpose:
Presentation
Description:
Green infrastructure is a widely used framework for conservation planning in the United States and elsewhere. The main components of green infrastructure are hubs and corridors. Hubs are large areas of natural vegetation, and corridors are linear features that connect hubs. Within the United States, assessments of green infrastructure: 1) use classical GIS routines (e.g., overlay, buffer) to map hubs and corridors; 2) are temporally static, lacking information on change and; 3) mainly undertaken by states or more local-scale jurisdictions (e.g., metropolitan areas). In this study, we use Morphological Spatial Pattern Analysis (MSPA) to define hubs and corridors using ca. 1992 and 2001 land-cover data from the U.S. National Land-cover Database (NLCD). MSPA uses image segmentation applied to one or more focal land-cover classes (e.g., all natural vegetation) to identify hubs, corridors, and other classes relevant to green infrastructure assessments. We describe and report on the use MSPA to map hubs and corridors for the conterminous United States, with an emphasis on detection of temporal change in those components. Using MSPA, we identified approximately 4,000 networks - disjunct hubs connected by corridors - for the conterminous United States. Approximately 10 percent of the networks crossed state boundaries. Comparing MSPA results for ca. 1992 and ca. 2001 data indicated a net loss of 1.72 x 106 ha of hubs and 1.76 x 106ha of corridors. Our national assessment can be used by states and other local jurisdictions as a template to extend conservation planning beyond their own borders.