Assessing Transportation Infrastructure Impacts on Rangelands: Test of a Standard Rangeland Assessment Protocol |
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| Authors: | Michael C. Duniway Jeffrey E. Herrick David A. Pyke Toledo P. David |
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| Affiliation: | 1. Research Soil Scientists, US Department of Agriculture–Agricultural Research Service Jornada Experimental Range, PO Box 30003, MSC 3JER, Las Cruces, NM 88003, USA;2. Research Plant Ecologist, US Geological Survey, Forest and Rangeland Ecosystem Science Center, 3200 SW Jefferson Way, Corvallis, OR 97331, USA;3. Graduate student, Texas A&M University, Department of Ecosystem Science and Management, College Station, TX 77843, USA;1. Research Ecologist, USDA-ARS Grassland, Soil and Water Research Laboratory, Temple, TX 76502, USA;2. Professor, Department of Ecosystem Science and Management, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77843, USA;3. Plant Physiologist, USDA-ARS Crops Research Laboratory, Fort Collins, CO 80526, USA;4. Research Associate, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Earth Systems Research Laboratory, Boulder, CO 80305, USA;5. Professor, Animal and Range Sciences Department, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, NM 88003, USA;6. Rangeland Management Specialist, USDA-NRCS Jornada Experimental Range, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, NM 88003, USA.;1. Associate Professor, Key Laboratory of Grassland Ecosystem of Ministry of Education/Rangeland Sciences Department, Gansu Agricultural University/Sino-U.S. Centers for Grazing Land Ecosystem Sustainability, Lanzhou, 730070, China;2. PhD Student, Key Laboratory of Grassland Ecosystem of Ministry of Education/Rangeland Sciences Department, Gansu Agricultural University/Sino-U.S. Centers for Grazing Land Ecosystem Sustainability, Lanzhou, 730070, China, Institute of Animal and Veterinary Science, Bijie, 551700, China;3. Visiting Professor, Key Laboratory of Grassland Ecosystem of Ministry of Education/Rangeland Sciences Department, Gansu Agricultural University/Sino-U.S. Centers for Grazing Land Ecosystem Sustainability, Lanzhou, 730070, China;4. Masters Student, Key Laboratory of Grassland Ecosystem of Ministry of Education/Rangeland Sciences Department, Gansu Agricultural University/Sino-U.S. Centers for Grazing Land Ecosystem Sustainability, Lanzhou, 730070, China;1. Associate Professor, Department of Geography, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA;2. Conservationist and Author, Chamisal, NM 87521, USA;3. Research Ecologist, USDA-ARS, Jornada Experimental Range, Las Cruces, NM 88003, USA;4. Supervisory Scientist, USDA-ARS, Jornada Experimental Range, Las Cruces, NM 88003, USA |
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| Abstract: | Linear disturbances associated with on- and off-road vehicle use on rangelands has increased dramatically throughout the world in recent decades. This increase is due to a variety of factors including increased availability of all-terrain vehicles, infrastructure development (oil, gas, renewable energy, and ex-urban), and recreational activities. In addition to the direct impacts of road development, the presence and use of roads may alter resilience of adjoining areas through indirect effects such as altered site hydrologic and eolian processes, invasive seed dispersal, and sediment transport. There are few standardized methods for assessing impacts of transportation-related land-use activities on soils and vegetation in arid and semi-arid rangelands. Interpreting Indicators of Rangeland Health (IIRH) is an internationally accepted qualitative assessment that is applied widely to rangelands. We tested the sensitivity of IIRH to impacts of roads, trails, and pipelines on adjacent lands by surveying plots at three distances from these linear disturbances. We performed tests at 16 randomly selected sites in each of three ecosystems (Northern High Plains, Colorado Plateau, and Chihuahuan Desert) for a total of 208 evaluation plots. We also evaluated the repeatability of IIRH when applied to road-related disturbance gradients. Finally, we tested extent of correlations between IIRH plot attribute departure classes and trends in a suite of quantitative indicators. Results indicated that the IIRH technique is sensitive to direct and indirect impacts of transportation activities with greater departure from reference condition near disturbances than far from disturbances. Trends in degradation of ecological processes detected with qualitative assessments were highly correlated with quantitative data. Qualitative and quantitative assessments employed in this study can be used to assess impacts of transportation features at the plot scale. Through integration with remote sensing technologies, these methods could also potentially be used to assess cumulative impacts of transportation networks at the landscape scale. |
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