Land Use: Lab 3

Ali Baranowski
Environmental Issues Lab
Professor Chirenje

Table of contents

I.
II.
III.
IV.
V.
VI.
VII.
VIII.

Abstract.3
Introduction..4
Objectives..5
Results..6-12
Discussion of Results13-14
Conclusion..15
Appendices16-17
References..18

Abstract

Effective land use planning is important to study in order to ensure that the social and economic
needs of a society are being met while avoiding any critical degradation of the environment.
With a growing population, tracking land use changes in the U.S has become more essential than

ever. By downloading data from the DEP website and utilizing Arc GIS software, shapefiles
were created for each of the six major land use types for four key years: 1986, 2002, 2007 and
2012. From this data, a multitude of maps and charts were created so that proper data analyses
could take place. By examining the data, trends could be found and questioning could begin on
why certain trends were occurring in Ocean County, NJ. Ocean County experienced increases in
urban land, water and wetland cover while experiencing decreases in agricultural land, forests
and barren land. The most marked changes were witnessed in urban land and agricultural acres.
Among urban land changes, the sub-categories of residential development,
transportation/communication/utilities and recreational land showed the highest increases from
1986 to 2012. Agricultural land decreased significantly from 1986 to 2012 and displayed
interesting changes in cropland cover and confined feeding operations. Many of the changes in
land use in Ocean County can be closely tied to urban sprawl which continues to be a troubling
issue for regions around the world. Ocean County has great opportunity to develop itself in a
sustainable manner if proper land use planning is taken into account in the future.

Introduction

Since the beginning of time, civilizations have been altering the land around them to fit their own
unique wants and needs. As technology has advanced, rapid changes in land use have occurred

and permanently altered our landscapes. These changes are especially profound in regions with
large population sizes and shifting population dynamics. New Jersey, the most densely populated
state in the United States, is a perfect example of such an area. Proper land use planning has
become more important than ever if we are to effectively utilize the remaining open space
available to us. If effective land use planning is not employed, the environmental, economic and
social values of a state will all decline. For example, a decrease in agricultural land can signify
loss of economic well-being for not just the farm owners but the county as a whole. Further, an
increase in urbanization can degrade local ecosystems by increasing air pollution and decreasing
biodiversity of an area.
Just in the small window of years between 1986 and 2012, dramatic changes have
shaped New Jersey counties in many of the six major land use categories; barren, agricultural,
urban, forests, water and wetlands. According to the New Jersey Department of Labor and
Workforce Development, Ocean Countys population is expected to increase by 54,033
individuals from 2010 to 2020. With a growth rate of 9.4 percent, Ocean County is projected to
be the fastest growing county in the projection period (Samuel, Packen & Ferdetta, 2014). All of
these population changes will create major developments in a county renowned for its
agricultural industry and ecologically crucial Pinelands forest. This report will focus on Ocean
Countys changing land use, particularly in the categories of agriculture and urban land. It will be
revealed how these two categories go hand-in-hand and what an increase in urbanization will
mean for the farmers of Ocean County and New Jersey as a whole.

Objectives
1) Learn the importance of monitoring land use changes.
2) Discover land use characteristics of Ocean County, NJ.

3) Learn why each land use type is experiencing changes in Ocean County.
4) Determine whether land use changes have been occurring in Little Egg Harbor, NJ, a
town in Ocean County, by examining Orthoquad photographs.
5) Gain practice analyzing GIS maps and Orthoquad photos.

Results

Figure 1: A chart displaying land use changes in Ocean County, NJ across the 6 major land use
types. Decreasing trends are highlighted in red while increasing trends are green. The unit is
acres.

Figure 2: A map showing changes in forest cover between 1986 and 2012. Green signifies 2012
while blue displays forests from 1986.

Figure 3: Changes in barren land cover from 1986 to 2012. Blue represents barren land in 2012
while green shows land from 1986.

Figure 4: Changes in wetland land cover from 1986 to 2012. Light blue represents 2012
wetlands while dark blue shows 1986 wetlands.

Figure 5: Changes in water cover from 1986 to 2012. Turquoise shows 1986 water and purple
shows 2012.

Figure 6: Map showing changes in agriculture from 1986 to 2012. Red represents 2012 land
cover while green shows 1986 land.

Figure 7: Map showing changes in urban land from 1986 to 2012. Green shows 1986 land cover
while purple shows 2012.

Figure 8: Map showing changes in agricultural crop land from 1986 to 2012. Light green
represents 1986 land cover while purple shows 2012.

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Figure 9: Map showing residential development from 1986 to 2012. Red signifies 1986
residential developments while green shows 2012. Orange color shows the area of overlap.

Figure 10: Chart showing acres of the 7 sub-categories of urban land use. Increasing trends are
highlighted in green.

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Figure 11: 2012 Orthoquad showing residential developments located within proximity to 57
Seameadow Drive, Little Egg Harbor, NJ.

Figure 12: A second orthoquad photo from 2012 showing residential developments located
within proximity to 57 Seameadow Drive, Little Egg Harbor, NJ.

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Figure 13: 1995 Orthoquad showing residential developments located within proximity to 57
Seameadow Drive, Little Egg Harbor, NJ.

Figure 14: A second orthoquad photo from 1995 showing residential developments located
within proximity to 57 Seameadow Drive, Little Egg Harbor, NJ.

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Discussion of Results
From Figure 1 the overall trends in land use changes for Ocean County can be distinguished.
While agriculture, barren land and forests have all decreased from 1986 to 2012; urban land,
water and wetlands have all increased. These results are all typical for a region experiencing the
demographic changes that Ocean County is. It was mentioned in the introduction that Ocean
County is projected to be the fastest growing county in NJ from 2010-2020. With a growing
population, comes the need for more urban development which explains why Ocean County has
gained 11,791.18 new acres of urban land between the years 2002 and 2012. From Figure 10 it
can be noticed that among the 7 sub-categories of urban land use, residential acreage has
increased the most. More developments are being created to supply homes for Ocean Countys
rapidly climbing population. Figure 9 shows the new residential developments that have cropped
up between 1986 and 2012. Two other sub-categories of urban land use that have shown marked
increases are Transportation/Communication/Utilities and Recreational areas, as seen in Figure
10.
With increased development often comes decreases in agricultural land. As a whole,
agricultural land in Ocean County has shown a net decrease of 5398 acres from 1986 to 2012.
This statistic shows that Ocean County farmers of 2012 have lost over half of the land that was
available to them in 1986.Henry Grinbaum, a farm lender with 33 years of experience, shed
some light on why agricultural land is changing in New Jersey in a recent news article published
by nj.com. The number of fulltime farmers has dwindled over the years in New Jersey as
housing developments have replaced farm fields. Younger farmers who want to expand their
holdings often move to Pennsylvania or Delaware or Virginia to buy because prices are too high
here for folks of ordinary income, he explained (Wright, 2015). Among the various subcategories of agricultural land use, the largest decrease was found in cropland where 4225.47
acres were lost between 1986 and 2012. Figure 8 displays this loss of cropland in Ocean County.
Confined feeding operations have also shown a decreasing trend. While these operations never
accounted for much land (only 113.98 acres in 1986), it is still remarkable that by 2012 the total
acres of land used for this purpose reduced by almost half (64.50 acres remained in 2012).
The amount of wetland land cover has increased slightly from 1986 to 2012 resulting in a
net increase of 2078.06 acres, as seen in Figure 1. While in the 1960s and 70s many wetlands
were filled in to be used for urban or agricultural development, the EPA has taken many steps
within the past three decades to restore and protect New Jerseys wetlands. In fact, a recent
article has stated that New Jersey wetlands and shorelines will get $102 million dollars to help
restore and enhance their ecosystems (Bauers, 2014). The recent movement towards preserving
these valuable regions is likely why there was an increasing rather than decreasing amount of
wetland acres in Ocean County.
Forest cover has stayed relatively consistent in Ocean County, within the time period
studied in this report. Figure 1 displays that 2,119.11 acres of forest were lost between 1986 and
2012. However, there was a large increase in forest land between 2007 and 2012, bringing the
total acres to about 197,201.21. This is very close to the original amount of acres recorded in
1986, 199,320.32 acres. This shows that although Ocean County has been experiencing urban
sprawl, the forests are remaining pretty well protected for now. This is likely due to the CMP
which limits development in the Pinelands in order to preserve the extensive and important
forests of this county.

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The amount of barren land in Ocean County has displayed a decreasing trend from 1986
to 2012. As seen in Figure 1, 12,065.07 acres of barren land were present in 1986 compared to
7,167.20 acres found in 2012. This signifies a decrease of about 4,897.87 acres which is
illustrated in Figure 3. Changes in barren land cover closely correlate with urban sprawl. Barren
land cover, as the name suggests, characterizes land that is largely void of vegetation/ earthen
material. This type of land is very easy for developers to build on since there is virtually nothing
standing in the way of new construction. Ocean County, in particular, has likely experienced
decreases in barren land cover because the Pineland forests are so heavily protected and difficult
to develop on. In comparison, barren land is widely available for the taking and is providing
ideal locations for urban sprawl to continue.
The last land use category to be analyzed for Ocean County is water cover. The amount
of water in Ocean County has stayed relatively constant over the time period studied, only
experiencing moderate increases. Shown in Figure 1, in 1986 there were a total of 83,698.86
acres of water while in 2012 there were 86,974 acres. This change is visually displayed in Figure
5. One possible reason for the increasing trend in water cover can be explained by a new study
conducted by NASA. While using new satellites to study the rate of sea level rise, NASA
discovered that as ice sheets continue to melt, changes in climate have caused Earths continents
to soak up and store an extra 3.2 trillion tons of water in soils, lakes and underground aquifers
(Rasmussen, 2016). This can easily explain why regions of New Jersey, as well as other states,
have experienced increases in water cover despite greater demands than ever on sources of
freshwater.
With increasing technology has come more opportunities than ever to track new
development in an individuals community. Personally, I had great interest in finding out just
how much or little my new residence in Little Egg Harbor, NJ has been affected by the
increasing urban development trend that Ocean County appears to be following. It turns out that
the streets near my home have not been greatly affected by urbanization. There are very few new
developments noticed near my home when the 1995 orthoquads and 2012 orthoquads are
compared (Figures 11, 12, 13 and 14 respectably). This is likely due to the fact that I live next to
a nature preserve, as evidenced by the large amounts of forest cover surrounding my home, and
development is not allowed on these areas. As Ocean Countys population continues to increase
it will be interesting to see if development stays limited in this area.

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Conclusion
Although not as dramatic as some of the other New Jersey counties, Ocean County has
experienced changes in land use that are important to study in order to effectively plan for the
future. With Ocean County projected to become home to an increasing number of residents over
the next decade, it is vital that forest, wetland and water land cover are conserved as much as
possible. Efforts should also be made to reduce urban sprawl and help agricultural land stay in
the hands of farmers rather than developers. By examining the data and maps above, it can be
concluded that the most impactful changes in land use for Ocean County were found in urban
land and agriculture. Among the sub-categories of urban land; residential areas,
Transportation/Communication/Utilities, and recreational areas have increased the most from
1986 to 2012. When it comes to agriculture, Ocean County has experienced great decline in this
land use category. Most significantly were decreases found in the sub-categories of cropland and
confined feeding operations. Through the examination of orthoquads from a residential area of
Little Egg Harbor, one might conclude that residential development is not increasing as much as
everyone seems to think. However, one cannot make these conclusions about regions of Ocean
County that are protected areas where development is not allowed to begin with. Only time will
tell if Little Egg Harbor and Ocean County as a whole can achieve a stable equilibrium among
the six land use types and maintain positive environmental, economic and social values in the
years to come.

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Appendices

Figure 15: Map showing changes in agricultural land between 2002 and 2012. Blue signifies
2002 land cover while red shows 2012 cover.

Figure 16: Map showing changes in urban land cover from 2002 to 2012. Turquoise represents
2002 urban land while purple shows 2012 land.

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Figure 17: Map showing changes in transportation/ communication/ utilities between 1986 and
2012. Green displays 1986 land cover while brown shows 2012.

Figure 18: Map showing changes in recreational land between 1986 and 2012. Blue shows 1986
land, pink shows 2012 and purple displays overlap.

Figure 19: Chart showing land use changes among 3 sub-categories of agricultural land for
Ocean County.

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References

Bauers, S. (2014, June 19). Millions go to NJ wetlands, shorelines. Retrieved February 15, 2016,
from http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/greenliving/Millions-go-to-NJ-wetlands-shorelines.html
Rasmussen, C. (2016, February 11). Study: Rising seas slowed by increasing water on land.
Retrieved February 15, 2016, from http://climate.nasa.gov/news/2398/
Samuel, V., Packen, S., & Ferdetta, F. (2014, June). Ocean County Community Fact Book (Rep.).
Retrieved February 15, 2016, from New Jersey Department of Labor and Workforce
Development website: http://lwd.dol.state.nj.us/labor/lpa/pub/factbook/ocefct.pdf
Wright, T. (2015, June 10). Farm lender sees changes in New Jersey agriculture. Retrieved
February 15, 2016, from http://www.nj.com/hunterdon-countydemocrat/index.ssf/2015/06/farm_lender_sees_changes_in_new_jersey_agriculture.html