Literature Review

Alig, R., Kline, J., and Lichtenstein, M. (2003). Urbanization on the US landscape: looking ahead to the 21st century. Landscape and Urban Planning 69, 219-234. 

·      The United States has seen a 34% increase in amount of land devoted to urban and built up uses between 1982 and 1997

·      Increase came predominantly from conversion of cropland and forestland

·      Largest increase in developed area happened in southern region of the country

·      Increase in developed land occurred mostly because of population density increase and personal income increase

·      Added development may also diminish agricultural output due to farmland loss

·      The United States has added more than 50 million people between 1980 and 2000, about 24% increase

·      The amount of US land devoted to urban and built up uses grew more than 34% between 1980 and 2000

·      Forests, in particular, have been the largest source of land converted to developed use in recent decades

·      Urban sprawl tied with crime as the leading local concern of Americans in a late-1990s poll

·      In 1999 approximately 1000 measures were introduced in state legislature to change planning laws and to make development in the US more orderly and conserving

·      The National Resource Conservation Service defined urban and built-up areas as “consisting of residential, industrial, commercial, and institutional land”

·      Most of the US developed area has been added since WWII

·      Developed area accelerated in 1990s

·      1982-1997 US developed area increased about 2% per year on average, according to the NRI

·      Regionally, the largest increase in US developed area between 1982 and 1997 were in the South, with ⅓ of developed area added during 1982-1997

·      Figure 3. US population by region

·      Projected development rates for 2025 vary by region with the south continuing to have the most developed area

·      More than 15% of US farmland is considered to have urban development significantly influence its market value

·      For urban influenced hectares, urban development pressures account for ⅔ of their market value. For many landowners this urbanizing influence can materially increase their net worth, and allow them to borrow more and perhaps expand their agricultural operations, or to sell their land and realize capital gains.

·      Some producers view urban sprawl as a business opportunity, providing an adjacent market that allows them to stay in farm production. they can shift their commodity mix to satisfy the nearby market demand for perishable fruits and vegetables, as well as other fresh commodities.

·      Adjacent urban development can mean that farm operator household members have off farm job opportunities. The average US farm household earns more income off the farm than on the farm. These off-farm opportunities in nearby urban areas have been a key to the survivability of many US farms.

·      Expansion of development in the south includes: above average population growth due to climate, attraction of immigrants, above average marginal consumption rates of land per resident, and income growth 

·      The south has land that is often suitable for multiple land uses

·      Fragmentation of ownership into several smaller ownership is known as parcelization, which can have profound impact on the economies of farming even when the land is not physically altered in any major way

Kline, J. and Alig, R. (1999). Does Land Use Planning Slow the Conversion of Forest and Farm Lands? Growth and Change (30), 3-22.

·      Results of study shows that Oregon’s land use planning program concentrated development within urban growth boundaries

·      Increasingly want to protect resources like agriculture and forest land

·      Historically, these lands have been valued for their productive capability and role in generating economic activity associated with production and processing of forestry and agriculture commodities

·      These resource lands (forest and farm) often fall outside of jurisdiction of city and town planning so are vulnerable to unregulated development

·      Can protect land directly (open space and farmland preservation program) or indirectly (regulating the pace, location, and character of development through state and regional land use planning)

·      Difficult to know whether downward trend is due to development rather than conversion to other land use

·      During 1950/1960 Oregon enacted the Land Conservation and Development Act in 1973

·      The percent of the nation’s population living in urban areas rose from 26 percent in 1870 to 74 percent in 1970

·      Increasing population and real personal income and improved transportation have increased the demand for land in urban uses

·      As land rents associated with crop and livestock production rise, the opportunity costs associated with maintaining rural land increase and rural land owners become more likely to sell forest and farmland for development

·      The likelihood of development on forest and farmland generally is suspected to be a function of population and income growth consistent with the economic hierarchy of land use

·      Land earning higher rents is less likely to be developed than land earning lower rents

·      Landowner characteristic may indicate differences in land management which may motivate land use decisions

·      Landowners possessing greater land management expertise or commitment to agricultural land may be less likely to develop such lands

·      Results of study show that the likelihood of conversion of resource lands to developed use has not been measurably different for lands located outside of urban growth boundaries and within forest and exclusive farm use zones

·      Oregon’s land use planning program did not significantly reduce the likelihood of development on resource lands since it was implemented

·      Land use planning alone is insufficient to protect resource lands in the long run

 

Glaeser, E. and Shapiro, J (2001). City Growth and the 2000 Census: Which Places Grew, and Why. Center on Urban & Metropolitan Policy, 1-14.

·      Among US cities with 1990 populations greater than 100,000

o   Median growth rate for cities in 1990s was 8.7 percent—more than double median growth rate of 1980s

o   Western cities grew fastest with average growth rate of 19 percent. Southern cities grew half as much as western

·      The media growth rate for cities in the 1990s was 8.7 percent—more than double the median growth rate in the 1980s

·      The growth rate for cities in the 1980s is 6.2 percent

·      Growth in the south and the west can partially be explained by the weather—cities with an average daily temperature in January of less than 30 degrees F grew by less than 5% on average, while cities above 50 degrees grew by more than 15 percent on average

·      Cities with less than 15 inches of average rainfall precipitation grew more than 20 percent on average, compared to less than 10 percent for cities with over 45 inches  

·      High human capital grew in the 1990s. The median level of schooling in the community or the percent of residents in the community measures human capital over the age of 25 with college educations. The average skill level in a community is a very good predictor of whether that city’s population will rise or fall

o   See this correlation between 1970 and 1990      

·       Driving cities have grown, public transportation cities have not

·      Cities with substantial public transportation systems lost population over the 1990s         

·      Immigrants contributed to city growth

·      Beyond weather the most important factor driving the success of a city is its human capital base.         

·      Overall, the pattern of city growth in the 1990s showed remarkable continuity with previous decades

Lubowski, R., Bucholtz, S., Classen, R., Roberts, M., Cooper, J., Gueroguieva, A., and R. Johansson. (2006). Environmental Effects of Agricultural Land-Use Change. The United State Department of Agriculture Economic Research Report (25), 1-75.

·      The total US cropland has remained roughly consistent for 100 years but economic conditions encourage farmers to expand production to less productive land or to shift to less productive cropland practices

·      Between 1982 and 1997 there was a net decline in cultivated cropland of 43 million acres (11 percent). Over the same period more than 127 million acres or 32 percent of cultivated cropland shifted between cultivated cropland and less intensive uses

·      Increased crop insurance subsidies in the mid-1990s encouraged farmers to expand cultivated cropland areas by 2.5 million acres (0.8 percent) in 1997

·      U.S. crop production has remained relatively stable for the last 100 years. The use of particular lands in the United States has changed over time, however, with some cropland converted to urban, forest, and other uses, and some forests, pasture, and range switching to cropland

·      Between 1982 and 1997, transitions from cultivated cropland to urban land occurred on just 1.5 percent of cultivated cropland.

·      US cropland used for crops was 330 million acres in 1910 and 340 million acres in 2004, a difference of 3 percent (this masks land-use changes within regions and from year to year)

·      From 1945 to 2002, US cropland used for crops declined by 23 million acres, or 6 percent. Over this period, cropland used for crops in the Corn Belt, Northern Plains, Pacific Northwest, and Mountain and Pacific regions increased by about 18 million acres (9 percent) while decreasing by 41 million acres (25 percent) in all other regions

·      Regions that started with a lot of cultivated cropland in 1982 also tended to have large net reductions in cultivated cropland

·      Even if the amount of land used for crop production is relatively stable, the specific land being used for crops is changing.

·      By reducing the risk and/or increasing he expected return from crop production, subsidized crop insurance may increase the amount of land in cultivated crops

·      Higher insurance subsidies increased 1997 cropland average by up to 1 percent

·      Expansion of crop insurance policies during the mid-1990s led to the introduction of 15 million new cropland acres or about 5 percent of cultivated cropland

·      That change in premium subsidies in the mid 1990s increased cultivated cropland area by an estimated 2.5 million acres, or 0.82 percent, with the bulk of this land (1.9 million acres) coming from uncultivated crop and pasture

·      1985 Farm Act, the government made soil conservation measures on highly erodible land and avoiding drainage of wetlands requirements for receiving certain farm program benefits, including subsidized crop insurance

·      1996 Farm Act removed crop insurance from the list of programs subject to conservation compliance

Urbanization Affects a Large Share of Farmland. Rural Conditions and Trends (10), 57-63.

·      Urban development has pushed outward from city centers in a form that increasingly intersperses urban activities with farm activities in traditionally rural areas

·      Farmland values rise above their value in agricultural production as land become valued for its future use in nonfarm activities

o   Factors unrelated to agricultural production, such as urban proximity and potential for recreational use, become important determinants of farmland values

·      US become increasingly urban, with approximately 79 percent of the population currently residing in urban places, residential and commercial development has spread further from city centers consuming more agricultural land in traditionally rural areas

·      The level terrain that makes farmland advantageous for agricultural production also makes these lands attractive for housing and commercial use.

·      The favorable climate associated with major national production centers for many high-valued fruits and vegetable crops mean that these areas, especially, are subject to intense pressure from urban development

·      Farmland is no longer an unlimited resource. Nowhere is this conflict more evident and more intense than at the urban fringe, which is the principal interface between agricultural and non agricultural use of farmland. Conflict develops between farmer sand new suburban neighbors

·      When urban development spreads to rural areas, the value of urban fringe farmland increases as its value for future commercial, industrial, and residential uses grows.

·      The market price of potential developable farmland is drive above its economic value for farm use

·      Urban influence raises farmland values

 

·      Urban influence accounts for 25 percent of the market value of all US farmland. For parcels within the urban-influence zone, urban influence constitutes 66 percent of market value

·      State and local land use policies have been primary means of preserving rural amenities

·      Voters and taxpayers across the US have consistently supported State and local initiatives to encourage retention of private land us undeveloped or open space land

·      All fifty states have right to farm laws

·      All 50 States have Right-to-Farm laws. All 50 States have some form of use-value assessment or preferential taxation favoring farmland. Conservation easements can be purchased in 20 States, at least 20 counties have transferable development rights programs, 16 States have agricultural district laws, and 24 States allow agricultural protection zoning.

·      The Federal role in farmland protection appears to be expanding

·      The Farmland Protection Policy Act of 1981 required Federal agencies to conduct reviews for the purpose of minimizing he extent to which Federal programs continue to the unnecessary and irreversible conversion of farmland to nonagricultural use

·      Farms for the Future program, created by the 1990 farm bill authorized a pilot program under which federally subsidized loans to State and local governments were used for purchase of agricultural conservation easement of farmland

·      The Federal Agricultural Improvement and Reform Act of 1996 directed USDA to carry out a program to purchase agricultural conservation easements on prime and unique farmland for the purpose of protecting it from nonagricultural uses. It authorized up to $35 million in matching funds for State and local farmland protection programs. 

Alig, R. and Healy, R. Urban and Built-Up Land Areas Changes in the United States: An Empirical Investigation of Determinants. Land Economics (63), 215-226.

·      According to census of population date urban area increased by 9 million acres during 1960-1970 and 13 million acres during 1970-1980

·      Mean urban acreage per person has also increased from .20 in 1960 to .23 in 1970 and .28 in 1980

·      There has been significant expansion in the amount of built up land not classified as urban

·      In the 1980 Census Bureau identified 46.9 million acres in the 49 contiguous states of which 33.1 million were in urbanized areas and 13.8 million were other urban land. Urbanized area population density was an average of 2,765 persons per square mile

·      Many of our urban areas contain significant amounts of land used for agriculture, particularly for various high-value horitulcutral products.

·      Juxtaposition through which urbanization affects land that is otherwise classified as forest, range, or some other non-urban category

Ahn, S. Plantinga, A., and Alig, R. (2002). Determinants and Projections of Land Use in the South Central United States. SJAF (2), 78-84.

·      Urban/ other land increased by 2.2 million ac from 1992 to 2050

·      The Resource Planning Act (RPA) of 1974 and the Soil and Water Resources Conservation Act of 1977 requires the US Department of Agriculture to develop programs to conserve, protect, and enhance forest, soil, and water resources for sustained uses.

·      Cropland increased by about 4.4 million ac in the 1960s and the 1970s but began to decline in the 1980s resulting in a 1.3 million ac net increase between 1960s and 1990s. the expansion of cropland until the early 1980s is partly due to the conversion of forestland to cropland.

·      The area of urban land has increased by 4.6 million ac since the 1960s to meet increasing demands for residential, commercial, and other developed uses that have accompanied the South Central regions growing population

·      Projections of land use in South Central Region when population change only

 

·      Projections of land use in the South Central region to 2050 with population and stumpage prices

 

·      Projections show continued increases in urban/ other land as a result of continued population growth in the region.

 

Jaffe, A. (1945). Population Trends and City Growth. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. (242), 18-24. 

  U.S. Department of Agriculture. 2009. Summary Report: 2007 National Resources Inventory, Natural Resources Conservation Service, Washington, DC, and Center for Survey Statistics and Methodology, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa. 123 pages

 

 

·      Table 2: Land cover/use of non-Federal rural land, in thousands of acres

 

·      Table 3: Cropland use, by state and year, in thousands of acres

·      Table 11—Prime farmland, by land cover/use, by state and year, in thousands of acres 

 

Coughlin, R., Berry, D., Bieri, K., Boyce, D.,  Kolhase, J., Leonardo, E., Pickett, J., Plaut, T., Stevens, B., Strong, A., Vining, D., and Wallace, K. (1977). Saving the Garden: The Preservation of Farmland and Other Environmentally Valuable Land. National Science Foundation. 1-322.

http://illiad.davidson.edu/pdf/135494.pdf

Kline, J., and Wichelns, D. (1996). Public Preferences Regarding the Goals of Farmland Preservation Programs. Land Economics (72), 538-549.

·      Use-value assessments attempt to slow the rate of conversion of agricultural land to nonagricultural use by assessing farmland at a lower rate than other land for tax purposes.