About the Project

Change in Davidson Agricultural Land Use 1938-2005

The above video shows a progression of images 

of Davidson with agricultural land from 1938 to 2005

Scope of the Project
      The scope of this project will be to explore attitudes of farmers and consumers in northern Mecklenburg County (Huntersville, Davidson, Cornelius) and Cabarrus County on land-use changes, specifically the loss of agricultural land. GIS technology and records will be used to understand the overall extent of land lost. Surveys and interviews with local farmers/residents will provide information that can be quantified and analyzed to further understand current stances.

Our Objectives

1. To investigate land use change in North Mecklenburg and Cabarrus county from the 1930s to present, focusing specifically on agricultural land lost to urbanization.
2. To conduct an assessment of how farmers in the area have been affected by urbanization through survey questions addressing land use change, economic implications, and general feelings about urbanization.
3. To understand customer’s attitude toward urbanization, local food, and farmer market use.

Expected Trends

In pursuing these objectives, we expect to observe the following trends. The large increase in population that has occurred in and around the Charlotte metropolitan area will have resulted in considerable and significant land loss to urbanization. We then expect to observe associated decreases in agricultural land and increases in urban land use. However, we anticipate that farmers will have been both negatively and positively impacted by urbanization. For example, increased urbanization has likely decreased the quality of the water and other essential resources to farming used which then negatively impacts the quality of the land and the crops it produces. On the other hand, with more people near the vicinity of their farm farmers likely have experienced an increased consumer base and increased profits. Overall, we expect that the cons will outweigh the pros and that the farmers’ attitudes toward land use change are expected to be generally against urbanization.