Exurban Sprawl in the Northern Forest:

 

The Role of Local Planning in Conserving

Ecosystem Goods and Services

 

 

 

 

 

By

 

Stephanie Gayle Elson

 

B.A., Wesleyan University, 2000

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thesis

 

Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of

Master of Arts in the Program in Environmental Studies at Brown University

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

PROVIDENCE, RHODE ISLAND

 

MAY 2006

 

 

Executive Summary

 

New England’s towns have been developing steadily for the past several decades, resulting in the transition of many formerly rural landscapes into exurban, and suburban environments. While some towns work to anticipate these changes, making proactive plans for how and where growth should occur, many towns only begin to formulate these plans after they experience unwanted effects of development.  Further, when towns do decide to plan for growth, they often do not have or do not use available social, ecological, and demographic data that may be necessary for effective planning efforts.

With these problems in mind, this research asks the question: how can New England’s towns merge community goals with existing scientific data and come up with a sustainable plan for future development?  The town of Campton, NH is used as a case study.  This research explores how recent population growth is impacting the ecosystem goods and services[1] and the qualities of the landscape that the residents of rural towns find valuable. Using Geographic Information Systems (GIS) technology, a model is developed for an integrated, proactive town planning framework that merges community goals with the best available data to produce a sustainable plan for future development.

The products of this research take three forms, presented here as the three components of this Master’s Thesis project. Each of the three products is based upon the same research, but has a different target audience. Thus, some material (maps, data, and text) is repeated and can be found in two or more of the products. The three products are:

 

1)                          An article to be submitted for publication. This article, “Managing the Exurbanization of Rural New England; A Model for Proactive Town Planning Using the Best Available Science,” analyzes spatial trends in the relationship between New Hampshire town population density changes and the intensity of town planning efforts. A clear pattern is demonstrated, one in which towns that have experienced a recent population boom have a more developed planning infrastructure, while towns that remain largely rural and forested demonstrate less investment in managing growth, suggesting that local level planning is usually reactive to growth, and not proactive. Further, this article addresses a problem with local level access to scientific data. Towns that do undertake planning initiatives often have a difficult time accessing the available scientific data that is needed for a comprehensive understanding of their environmental and cultural landscape. A geographic information platform is used to provide a model for creating a proactive, sustainable plan for future growth.

 

2)                          A report to the Town of Campton. This report, “Campton’s Past, Present and Future: A Geographic Information Systems Based Approach,” was presented to the town’s boards (Select and Planning Boards, and Conservation Commission) in February of 2006. In contrast to the article, which takes an academic perspective and contextualizes the growth seen in Campton within a broader discussion of development trends in rural New England, this report takes a more professional / consulting perspective. It represents the final product of one year of working with the town to develop a GIS data system in an attempt to answer the question, “How can Campton plan for development in a way that will conserve the values of its rural landscape?” It is designed to both inform and empower the Town of Campton to take an active role in shaping the future of the town’s landscape, and provides the town with information necessary to initiate a conversation about the options the town has for preserving its rural character and way of life. 

 

3)                          A website: http://www.envstudies.brown.edu/projects/CamptonGIS. The content of this website is almost identical to the report, but reformatted for web presentation. There are several intended audiences for this product. First, in making the data publicly accessible, the website is designed to engage the larger Campton community in the discussion about the town’s past, present and future. Second, it is meant to be a tool for Campton residents interested in learning about town attributes, whether to help them manage their land, decide where to purchase a property, or gain tools for community activism.  Third, it is meant to present the project’s methodology as a model for other towns in the region to use as they both experience and anticipate development pressure.

 

These three products work together to achieve several goals. On a local level, this project attempts to make a difference in the Town of Campton’s future landscape, engaging the local community as well as the town Boards in raising awareness about the impact of individual decisions. On a larger scale, this project presents tools for strategic, carefully researched town planning and decision-making that other towns in the region can use as they experience development pressures. Finally, this project makes the case for preventative and deliberate land-use planning. While most of the conservation planning in New Hampshire over the past couple of decades has been focused in Southern New Hampshire where exurban sprawl has been dramatically reshaping the landscape, this project argues for equal if not more attention to the more northerly areas, where opportunity still exists for forethought to result in cost-effective planned and sustainable growth.

This project presents tools to New England’s communities, empowering them to take the future of the landscape into their own hands.  However, the ultimate success of the project’s goals depends heavily on whether or not these tools are used by communities to inform a meaningful planning process. In this manner, this project is not an end result, but hopefully, it is a beginning.

 

 

 

 

Acknowledgements

 

 

            The author would like to thank her advisor, Dr. Steven Hamburg, Associate Professor, Brown University; and her thesis readers, Rodger Krussman, Project Manager, Trust for Public Land; and Anne Tate, Associate Professor, Rhode Island School of Design. She would also like to thank the Land Use Land Cover Change Research Group at Brown University; Caroline Karp, Senior Lecturer, Brown University; Lynn Carlson, Brown University; Dave McGraw, Society for the Protection of New Hampshire Forests; the Town of Campton, NH; Katie Callahan, New Hampshire Fish and Game; Carol Foss, New Hampshire Audubon; Phil Auger, University of New Hampshire; Jennifer Lingeman, Complex Systems Data Center, University of New Hampshire; George Hastings, New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services.

 

 

 


[1] Ecosystem services are processes by which the natural environment produces resources useful to people, such as provision of clean air and water, forest resources, flood control, and pollination of crops, to name just a few examples (Costanza and Daly, 1992; Daily, 1997).