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What’s measured
This indicator currently measures developed land in acres per person for Cabarrus, Mecklenburg, and Union. Imagery data has been compiled as part of the
Urban Growth Model
study conducted by the
UNC Charlotte Center for Applied Geographic Information Systems (CAGIS)
and is currently available for all counties in the region.
Developed acres include both residential and nonresidential development, excluding agriculture, and are assessed using satellite imagery, taken at roughly 10-year intervals from 1976 to 2006. The imagery is on a 30-meter by 30-meter pixel scale. Population data are taken from inter-censal estimates of the U.S. Census.
Imagery is now available for all counties in the 14-county region for all four time periods (1976, 1985, 1996 and 2006). Please note that data from 1985 was used instead of data from 1986 because of the high degree of cloud cover in the 1986 satellite imagery.
Why it’s measured
Per capita developed acres measures how land development is keeping pace with population growth. Over time, it indicates if the population is requiring more or less total developed land per person, not just for housing but for roads, jobs, etc.
Indicator results
In 2006, developed acres for Cabarrus, Mecklenburg and Union counties averaged just over a third of an acre per person, at 0.37. The figure represents the three counties together as a portion of the region.
Developed acres per person in 2006 ranged from a low of 0.28 for Mecklenburg County to a high of 0.65 for Union County. The three-county average declined slightly over the past decade, as did both Union and Mecklenburg counties. Cabarrus County showed an increase in developed acres per person during that same period.
The data also showed a three-county average rate of land development from 1996 to 2006 of 28.9 acres per day.
Evaluation
Mecklenburg County’s population and developed acreage both of which are the largest among the three counties examined at this time drive the three-county average. It is premature to draw conclusions about trends in the region, or even for any county, without data from the rest of the counties and from prior decades. It is clear, though, that the differences between the counties are as expected: Mecklenburg’s relatively low number of developed acres per person corresponds to its high degree of urbanization and higher density of development in and around Charlotte’s center city area; Union’s higher number of developed acres per person reflects its suburbanizing pattern of development.
It is interesting, however, to compare the preliminary results from the current study by CAGIS to estimates established in a previous study. A 1998 UNC Charlotte Urban Institute study using a different methodology estimated 41 acres per day average rate of land development from 1980 through 2020, based on current and projected land uses and population for a 15-county version of the region (the Indicators Project’s 14 counties plus Cherokee, South Carolina). The 1998 Institute study also estimated 13.8 acres per day for the 3-county portion of the region. The difference between the two estimates 13.8 acres developed per day in the 40-year period from 1980 to 2020 according to the 1998 Institute study, and 28.9 acres developed per day in the 10-year time period from 1996 to 2006 in the CAGIS study could be indicative of a real increase in the average rate of development in those three counties since the 1998 study was conducted, or could simply reflect differences in the methodologies.
The 1998 Institute study also showed the same pattern of developed acres per person as the CAGIS study when the 1990 results for Cabarrus, Mecklenburg and Union counties were compared: Mecklenburg had the lowest rate (0.38), Union had the highest (0.74), and Cabarrus fell between the two (0.69).
Connections
In a rapidly urbanizing area such as the Charlotte region, development and its patterns influence many facets of quality of life. More compact development tends to yield more cost-effective delivery of public services because public infrastructure is not as spread out. It also tends to reduce water runoff associated with roads and parking lots. Agricultural land uses and rural ways of life are more readily maintained when competition for urban and suburban uses doesn’t push up land prices.
On the other hand, without careful design, more dense development may not reduce vehicle trips, improve air quality or traffic congestion, nor necessarily produce vibrant and aesthetically pleasing places to live and work.
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