Charlestown Openspace Prioritization Project:
A Participatory Model Using the World Wide Web

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Does property value of respondents affect openspace prioritization?  

 

Of the 124 survey respondents, 87 provided address information that allowed for a geocoded address match, using 1997 tax assessor data. The remaining 37 respondents were either part time residents, and provided addresses for their primary out-of-town residences, or provided post office box information. Tax assessor data provide information for the total assessed value of parcels upon which respondents reside. Using this value, respondents were divided into three tiers:

  1. Parcels valued between $50,000 and $150,000 (30 Respondents)
  2. Parcels valued between $150,000 and $250,000 (39 Respondents)
  3. Parcels valued between $250,000 and $500,000 (18 Respondents)

Responses for each of these tiers were analyzed to determine trends that would test whether property value is an influential factor in openspace prioritization. A larger sample size would have allowed for analysis of more parcel value tiers. For this analysis, parcel value tiers were catagorized so that the number of respondents in each tier was sufficient for qualitative analysis. Total parcel value is used here as an economic indicator for respondents. It was determined that asking for this information in the survey could have posed challenges to respondents, by both difficulty of task and comfort of response. While a more direct indicator, such as annual income, may have provided a more robust analysis, trends in openspace objectives suggest that parcel value does have a bearing on openspace priorities.

 

 
   

Willingness to Pay

Although openspace positions for each tier reflect aggregate findings, respondents' willingness to pay increased in accordance with increasing property value. However, this finding did not satisfy a Kruskal-Wallis Test of significance. Therefore, property value does not appear to influence respondents' willingness to pay.

 
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Openspace Objectives

When analyzing tiered results for openspace objectives, three interesting findings should be noted.

  • While Tiers II and III share their top three objectives for openspace preservation, Tier III values protection of water resources with greater intensity than Tier II.

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  • Tier I values the ability of openspace preservation to slow the rate of land development most.

  • While the protection of threatened/endangered species ranks fourth with both Tiers I and II, it ranks last with Tier III.
 
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CES Land Use Theses Contact: Justin Huxol