13 articles in this category
So you're staring at a concrete channel that used to carry salmon. Or a levee system designed for a 100-year flood that now fails every five years. Th...
The idea sounds neat on paper: set a cap on how much carbon you can release when you convert forest to farmland, then track it year after year. But re...
Land-use cycles don't wait. Every decade, another wave rolls in: the solar farm that flattens hedgerows, the subdivision that paves over a burial grou...
Here's the problem no one talks about at the kickoff meeting. You've got a 10-year restoration plan. The science is solid. The grant is signed. But th...
You're staring at a model output. It says convert that forest to farmland now, because the net present value is higher. But something gnaws at you. Th...
Land changes faster than paper. A zoning map printed in 2020 might already be laughably wrong—new subdivisions, dried-up wetlands, shifted crop lines....
Temporal land-use models are typically built to optimize: maximize crop yield, minimize commute time, allocate housing efficiently. But optimization w...
Zoning is seldom neutral about time. A decision in 1958 to set minimum lot sizes of one acre in a fringe township might still shape development patter...
A farmer clears forest in Mato Grosso in 2015, plants soy for a decade, then moves on. By 2035, the land is degraded, carbon is uncounted, and a new f...
The permit said temporary , six years ago. The chain-link fence has rusted. The gravel lot is now a de facto truck depot. Nobody remembers who approve...
Land conversion decisions are rarely permanent. A forest cleared for soy might revert to silvopasture in a decade; a drained peatland might be rewette...
A pine plantation rotates every 25 years — nothing under it but needles and silence. Down the road, an oak-hickory forest that has turned over twice i...
When a cornfield becomes a subdivision in eighteen months, no one holds a funeral. But something dies anyway: the memory of what was there. Land-use c...