Conservation Zoning

Conservation zoning is a spatial planning strategy used to manage urban and rural landscapes and sometimes marine areas. The term can refer to any land use or marine planning process whose primary goal is purported to be the conservation of social and/or natural resources. It is a territorial mechanism that delineates bounded zones for which particular rules apply—in this case, rules meant to conserve particular environmental values. At its most basic, conservation zoning sets out acceptable density levels and residential footprints to ensure the persistence of green space. In urban landscapes, both social and environmental characteristics are targets of conservation zoning, whereas in rural areas, conservation zoning is used primarily to protect natural resources and ecosystem services. Geography and geographers have played a role in determining the types of conservation zones appropriate to a planning exercise and, through the use of spatial technologies and multicriteria decision support, have been integral to the establishment and mapping of conservation zones.

While residential, industrial, and commercial zoning are common practices in urban land use planning, conservation zoning is a relatively new addition to the urban-planning toolbox meant to promote the building of more sustainable communities. Urban conservation zones range from protected heritage architecture to riparian buffer zones that border fish-bearing streams and their floodplains, as well as urban green spaces. Commonly, conservation zoning limits particular kinds of development, such as land clearing and construction, that may threaten the targeted social or environmental characteristics.

In rural and peri-urban areas, conservation zoning is a way of promoting land-based conservation values on private property. Conservation easements and land trusts are ways in which property owners can receive municipal tax incentives in exchange for preserving their land to ensure the provision of habitat and/or ecosystem services. Greenbelts or greenways are examples of conservation zones found most often bordering urban areas. Both restrict development to preserve forest, agriculture, or otherwise environmentally sensitive land. Parks and protected areas can also be thought [Page 572]of as exercises in conservation zoning where core zones are delimited from multiple-use, recreational, or buffer zones.

In the vast oceans, especially the Pacific, conservation zoning is a key means of ensuring and promoting networks of marine-protected areas (e.g., Papahānaumokuākea, Marianas Trench, Rose Atoll, and Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monuments of the United States).

The process of conservation zoning is political and requires the spatially explicit analysis of numerous data sets—everything from soil, land cover, slope, and connectivity to property values, public perception, recreational use and potential, and demographic characteristics. Geographic tools, for example, remote sensing and geographic information systems, are ideal for such analysis. Their use informs decision-making processes and helps identify lands suitable for conservation zoning.