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Monitoring Local Impervious Surface Trends Using Indices Derived from Property Tax and Several Landsat Datasets




Author(s)

Marek Topolski

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DOI:10.17265/2162-5298/2015.06.006

Human economic and social needs can be in conflict with ecosystem needs. Land development increases impervious surfaces causing significant negative impacts to aquatic ecosystems. Many impervious surface estimates are derived from remote sensing data, developed by using different methods and often out of date. Remote sensing data is often at scales applicable to regional management, but not local planning decisions. To date, no standardized annual dataset of percent impervious surface exists for use at both local and watershed scales. Effective communication between natural resource managers and local planners has been lacking. One solution is to monitor percent impervious surface with a relative index rather than direct measure. A relative index model can use a currency, like foundation square feet per hectare, which is useful for all decision makers. One data source for developing a relative index of impervious surface is property tax data. These data document annual land development at local scale. Here, the author presents the use of Maryland property tax data to index land development and percent impervious surface.

Geographically weighted regression, impervious surface, Landsat, MdProperty View, relative index, spatial analysis, tax records