The Effect of Urban Sprawl on Timber

By Stephen A. Barlow, Ian A. Munn, David A. Cleaves, and David L. Evans T he potential impact of urbanization on the South’s timber supply is dramatic. Between 1960 and 1990, the South’s share of the nation’s population increased from 30.7 percent to 34.4 percent (US Department of Commerce 1992). The amount of land in the South swallowed by metropolitan areas has more than doubled, from 9.8 percent in 1960 to 23.2 percent in 1990 (US Department of Commerce 1965, 1992). The increase in metropolitan land use, or urban sprawl, is out of proportion to the urban population growth and indicates that development is spreading beyond the core cities. Urban development is traditionally more scattered than most other land uses, and most of the increase in urban land comes from forestland (LaGro and DeGloria 1992). With population increasing and metropolitan areas expanding, much of the South’s commercial forestland now falls within counties with populations of 250,000 or more. These metropolitan counties contain 26 percent of the Southeast’s timberland-about 28 million acres (DeForest et al. 1991). However, as much as 43 percent of the commercial timberland in metropolitan counties may be unavailable for timber management and should more appropriately be considered real estate (Befort et al. 1988). Clearly, urbanization directly reduces long-term timber availability as forested lands are lost to urban development. The total impact of urbanization, however, is far greater because timber management is influenced by the interaction of urban and forestry uses far beyond the urban edge. In areas within convenient driving distance of a metropolitan area, forested land has become more valuable for development than for growing timber (Lubka 1982), and active timber managemenr is therefore sharply curtailed. Harris and DeForest (1993) found that 19 percent of Georgia’s forestland was in metropolitan counties, yet these counties accounted for only 4 percent of the land enrolled in the Conservation Reserve Programs tree-planting option. The urban-forest interface is not only a geographic area where forest management meets urban development, but aIso a political arena where people holding different values for the forest interact (Vaux 1982). These conflicts are more than just boundary disputes; they are vocal opposi t ion to t radi t ional fores t management practices (Shands 1991). Former urbanites often introduce regulations to protect suburban and rural areas from perceived damage caused by forest management activit ies (Cubbage and Siegel 1985; Cubbage 1995). The regulations frequently include requirements for t imber harvest permits, buffer zones, and restricted silvicultural practices (Martus et al. 1995). Numerous authors have investigated how urbanization affects forestry: landowner characteristics influence timber management behavior (BinkIey 1981; Romm et al. 1987; Dennis 1989, 1990); forest fragmentation increases management costs by reducing tract size (Harris and DeForest 1993); and tract characteristics-proximity of roads, distance to markets, and ownership category, public or private-also affect timber management decisions (Wear and Flamm 1993). This study examines how one aspect of timber management-harvestingis influenced by demographic and physical characteristics associated with urbanization. Demographic data from the US Census Bureau are combined with USDA Forest Service Forest Inventory and Analysis (FIA) data for Alabama and Miss iss ippi us ing ARC/INFO geographic information system (GIS) software. A binary logit model is developed ’