THE DRIVING FORCES OF LAND CHANGE IN THE NORTHERN PIEDMONT OF THE UNITED STATES |
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| Authors: | ROGER F AUCH DARRELL E NAPTON STEVEN KAMBLY THOMAS R MORELAND JR KRISTI L SAYLER |
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| Institution: | 1. Research geographer at the U.S. Geological Survey's Earth Resources and Observation Science Center (eros), Sioux Falls, South Dakota 57198;2. [auch@usgs.gov].;3. Visiting scientist at eros and a professor of geography at South Dakota State University, Brookings, South Dakota 58007;4. [darrell.napton@sdstate.edu].;5. Geographers at the U.S. Geological Survey's Eastern Geographic Science Center, Reston, Virginia 20192;6. [kambly@usgs.gov], [tmorelan@usgs.gov].;7. Physical scientist at eros;8. [sayler@usgs.gov]. |
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| Abstract: | Driving forces facilitate or inhibit land‐use / land‐cover change. Human driving forces include political, economic, cultural, and social attributes that often change across time and space. Remotely sensed imagery provides regional land‐change data for the Northern Piedmont, an ecoregion of the United States that continued to urbanize after 1970 through conversion of agricultural and forest land covers to developed uses. Eight major driving forces facilitated most of the land conversion; other drivers inhibited or slowed change. A synergistic web of drivers may be more important in understanding land change than individual drivers by themselves. |
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| Keywords: | driving forces ecoregions land‐use change Northern Piedmont urbanization |
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