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As far back as the
1920s, America's leaders dreamed of a "national system of parks." And today, millions of Americans and visitors from around the world enjoy our "public conservation lands." These parks, forests, refuges, wildernesses and other publicly managed conservation lands are a "dream come true."
Just how important are these local, state and federal lands -- referred to in this report as conservation lands? And, is the dream still alive?
Conservation lands serve a myriad of vital purposes. They provide living laboratories to scientists, classrooms to teachers, inspiration to artists of all types, adventure and recreation for families, respite for city-dwellers, habitat for species -- connections both miniscule and monumental to our culture, history and natural wonders.
And, there's more. There's money. Many states now consider conservation lands to be top income generators. Directly, they provide income from recreation use. Indirectly, the mere proximity to conservation lands can send property values and taxes soaring.
A recent report by the University of Montana showed that land prices around public conservation areas are among the highest in the nation. Residential property costs as much as one million dollars an acre in Wyoming, Maine and the Virgin Islands. Imagine what the real estate taxes must be like for such expensive property!
And yet, the National Park Trust has discovered the dream has gone bad, turned into a nightmare.
Governors across the country are calling "sprawl" one of their greatest concerns, and states like Maryland are setting aside public funds to preserve private open spaces and more public conservation lands. San Francisco, one of the world's most visited cities, spends one of the highest levels of public expenditures on their parks. Repeatedly, annual reports on America's most livable cities include access to open space as a critical factor.
Other nations are equally concerned with their conservation lands. Canada has created a panel, which is calling for a freeze on community development especially around parks.
The densely populated England is paying farmers "to improve the natural beauty and diversity" of their lands. According to one news report, the program is so successful that the government is overwhelmed with applications.
How do we make some comparisons and get a handle on our nation's situation? To answer these questions, the National Park Trust has compiled the first national Assessment of Conservation Lands by state, then compared this to the citizenry in that state, and finally ranked the states total public conservation lands per capita. The ten states with the worst ration of conservation land per capita include some surprises. Small eastern states like Rhode Island, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Delaware and Maryland that are in the top ten have extensive coast lines and access to public waters.
Yet larger states like Ohio, Iowa, New York, Indiana and Pennsylvania are also in the top ten. All ten are states with small federally owned public conservation lands. Conversely, the ten states that rank the best in publicly owned conservation lands per capita (Alaska, Wyoming, Nevada, Montana, Idaho, Utah, New Mexico, Arizona, Oregon) are western states with sparsely populated regions. Surprising to some, several of these states depend on public access to these conservation lands as a mainstay of their economies.
When combining this chart with threatened state parks (Georgia, North Carolina, Minnesota, Nevada, West Virginia, Colorado, Florida, Indiana, Ohio, Montana), the surprise is that abundance or absence of other public conservation lands does not correlate to the pressures on state parks. In fact, what ties these states together is the pressure from development, sprawl and high land values, regardless of the state's size, location or population density.
Our survey found that these pressures are a common threat to state parks throughout the nation. "Development, sprawl and high land values" have been found to be symbiotic to one another, i.e., thriving upon one another. Ironically, often in the end, they diminish or destroy the beauty, solitude and enjoyment of the park; much like a parasite undermines or destroys its host.
The solutions are many and varied. A few include:
1. Pass important bond referenda, so that more parks or other conservation lands will be set aside;
2. Develop transitional (buffer) zones of private agricultural, forest or visual corridors around parks;
3. Mandate public agencies like transportation are being asked to protect parks, not encourage development around them; and,
4. Allocate public funds for beautification of private lands and public access.
These are the things that must be done. Only future generations will be able to assess our success.
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