National Gap Analysis Program

PAD-US information in USFS Recreation and Protected Land Resources Report

bioadmin — Fri, 15 Feb 2013 15:54:31 +0000

This report provides an overview of the public and private land and water resources of the United States. Described is use of natural and developed land as recreation resources with an emphasis on nature-based recreation. Also described is land protection through conservation organizations and public funding programs, with an emphasis on protecting private land through funding for purchase or for conservation easements. Outdoor recreation resources include land, water, snow and ice, scenery, developed sites, facilities, and user services. Protected land resources range from farm lands to remote wilderness, but mostly are the undeveloped lands in the U. S. with various forms of protection status.

The total U.S. land area is 2.43 billion acres, which contains 169 million acres of water, and consists of a diversity of land use and cover types. The United States loses about two million acres of forest, farm, and open space each year. In attempting to conserve such lands, land trusts and governments have instituted programs to obtain easements or purchase the land outright. The Federal government holds in trust about 640 million acres of land (30 percent of the country’s total land area). This includes national parks, national forests, national wildlife refuges, and other Federal agency ownerships. These lands, along with state and local government lands are important recreation resources serving the public interest. Private lands and recreation businesses are also important recreation resources. Projections to 2060 of per capita area of public and private land and water show a steady downward trend across all regions of the United States. Full report at: http://www.srs.fs.fed.us/pubs/gtr/gtr_srs169.pdf

FY12 State Data Steward Project Awards Grants

bioadmin — Thu, 31 Jan 2013 00:05:53 +0000

GAP awarded FY12 State Data Steward Project grants to nine states (NV, AZ, KS, OK, TX, IN, AL, NJ, AK) to improve data sharing capacity in the state, build data inventories, and increase the efficiency of PAD-US updates. Work begins October 1, 2012 with a project orientation webinar and Standard Manual review. Final geodatabase deliveries are expected September 30, 2013.

New PAD-US Data Release – version 1.3, November 2012

bioadmin — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 23:57:54 +0000

USGS GAP has published a new version of PAD-US. Version 1.3 was completed in November 2012 and is now available for download. New features are described on the Data/History page.

Get your data now! Go to the data download page!

GAP Data featured in ‘App-lifying USGS Earth Science Data’ on Challenge.gov

bioadmin — Mon, 14 Jan 2013 23:00:16 +0000

The USGS is challenging the Nation’s developers to use Federal earth science data in new ways. We are seeking new visualizations and applications for datasets that could address some of today’s perplexing

GAP Map appears in ESRI “Mapping the Nation” publication

gapadmin — Thu, 31 May 2012 19:25:20 +0000

Redundancy of Ecological Systems in Landscape Conservation Cooperatives

US Fish and Wildlife Service’s Landscape Conservation Cooperatives (LCC) provide a national framework for making decisions at landscape scales. Using the LCC framework and GIS, GAP measured and analyzed the redundancy of ecological systems and helped reassess conservation priorities across the nation. The map appeared in ESRI’s 2012 “Mapping the Nation”.

Mapping the Nation: Government and Technology Making a Difference is a collection of GIS maps illustrating the many ways that federal government agencies rely on GIS analysis to help make the world a better place. Pulled from a broad range of agencies, maps included in the book demonstrate how the technology can be used to evaluate and respond to social, economic, and environmental concerns at local, regional, national, and global levels.

GAP Landcover Viewer Updated

gapadmin — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 19:52:15 +0000

GAP updated national land cover data set (version 2) has been updated and crosswalked to the five highest levels of the National Vegetation Classification System. This land cover data provides detailed information on the vegetation of the United States and enables data users to make conservation or land use planning decisions for the entire range of a habitat type across administrative boundaries.

This data set can be explored at multiple levels of detail with GAPs updated landcover viewer.

Visit the viewer

The GAP land cover viewer allows online inspection of detailed data and access to downloads.

GAP Supports America’s Great Outdoors Initiative

gapadmin — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 21:16:49 +0000

From April through July 2011, Secretary Salazar and senior DOI officials visited governors and other high-ranking state resource staff throughout the nation to discuss President Obama’s Americas Great Outdoors (AGO) Initiative. The Secretary’s briefing materials included USGS Gap Analysis Program (GAP) maps illustrating each state’s federal and state land ownership boundaries.

Read the entire article in the USGS @ccess Bulletin

Species Viewer Receives Award

gapadmin — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 22:04:04 +0000

GAP’s recently launched Species Viewer placed third in the category of Web-based GIS Applications at ESRI’s User Software Applications Fair in July, 2011. The viewer currently has more than 800 vertebrate species ranges and 260 distribution models. With more than 2000 species being modeled, new ranges and distribution models are being added daily. The web viewer was presented in conjunction with a talk given by Adam Radel and Jeff Lonneker titled “Access to National Conservation Databases via the Web.”

IUCN Definitions

gapadmin — Tue, 21 Jun 2011 21:45:39 +0000

A summary of the relationship between GAP Status Codes and IUCN Definitions

This is not a crosswalk between IUCN Categories and GAP Status Codes, but it helps summarize their definitions and relationship. Only GAP Status Codes 1 and 2 meet the definition of protected by IUCN as, “A clearly defined geographical space, recognized, dedicated and managed, through legal or other effective means, to achieve the long-term conservation of nature with associated ecosystem services and cultural values”.

GAP Status Code 3 and 4 lands cannot be assigned an IUCN Category. While IUCN Ia, Ib, II are more likely to be GAP 1, many of these areas cannot permit natural disturbance events to persist and are GAP 2. Similarly, there are many IUCN Category III, IV and V protected areas that are managed as GAP 1. USGS GAP maintains an approved crosswalk to assign IUCN Categories to US protected areas based upon their management designation, landowner, GAP Status Code and size. Contact Lisa Duarte (208-885-3013) for the most current version.

IUCN Category/Definition	GAP Category/Definition
Category Ia: Strict Nature Reserves are strictly protected areas set aside to protect biodiversity and also possibly geological/geomorphological features, where human visitation, use and impacts are strictly controlled and limited to ensure preservation of the conservation values. Such protected areas can serve as indispensible reference areas for scientific research and monitoring.	GAP Status 1: An area having permanent protection from conversion of natural land cover and a mandated management plan in operation to maintain a natural state within which disturbance events (of natural type, frequency, intensity, and legacy) are allowed to proceed without interference or are mimicked through management..
Category Ib: Wilderness Areas are protected areas are usually large unmodified or slightly modified areas, retaining their natural character and influence, without permanent or significant human habitation, which are protected and managed so as to preserve their natural condition.
Category II: National Park protected areas are large natural or near natural areas set aside to protect large-scale ecological processes, along with the complement of species and ecosystems characteristic of the area, which also provide a foundation for environmentally and culturally compatible spiritual, scientific, educational, recreational and visitor opportunities.
Category III: Natural Monument or Feature protected areas are set aside to protect a specfic natural monument, which can be a land form, sea mount, submarine caverns, geological feature such as caves or even a living feature such as an ancient grove. They are generally quite small protected areas and often have high visitor value.	GAP Status 2: An area having permanent protection from conversion of natural land cover and a mandated management plan in operation to maintain a primarily natural state, but which may receive uses or management practices that degrade the quality of existing natural communities, including suppression of natural disturbance.
Category IV: Habitat/species management protected areas aim to protect particular species or habitats and management reflects this priority. Many category IV protected areas will need regular, active interventions to address the requirements of particular species or to maintain habitats, but this is not a requirement of this category.
Category V: Protected landscape/seascape protectected areas occur where the interaction of people and nature over time has produced an area of distinct character with significant ecological, biological, cultural and scenic value
Category VI: Protected area with sustainable use of natural resources are generally large, with much of the area in a more-or-less natural condition and wherea a proportion is under sustainable natural resource management and where such exploitation is seen as one of the main aims of the area.
Not applicable	GAP Status 3: Area having permanent protection from conversion of natural land cover for the majority of area. Subject to extractive uses of either broad, low-intensity type (eg. Logging) or localized intense type (eg. Mining). Confers protection to federally listed endangered and threatened species throughout the area.
Not applicable	GAP Status 4: No known public/private institutional manadates/legally recognized easements.
Permanently unassigned	Holdings that do not meet the IUCN definition of a protected area or are not GAP Status 1 or 2.

GAP data used to assess protection levels of Southern Forests

gapadmin — Fri, 10 Jun 2011 19:12:02 +0000

Conservation status of the southern forests in the United States

Southern Forests for the Future works to raise awareness about the status and importance of the United States. The organization used GAP data to analyze Southern Forests and portray information about them in an online interactive map.

Researchers reported that the southern United States currently contains approximately 39.5 million acres of protected areas—many of them forested—distributed throughout the region. The majority of protected areas in the South are federally owned, while the rest are owned by state and local governments, nongovernmental organizations, or private citizens. The federal government owns approximately 29.8 million acres, including 12.9 million acres in national forests, 5.4 million acres in national parks, and 3.8 million acres in wildlife refuges. The 13 southern states combined own approximately 3.6 million acres of state forests and 1.7 million acres of state parks. Approximately 12.8 percent of southern forests are currently located within these protected areas with 1.1 percent under status 1 protection, 3.8 percent under status 2, and 7.9 percent under status 3.

More Information

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View the Final Report