Therese M. Donovan Robert Manning John Austin Charles A. Bettigole 2014 <p><span>The conversion of natural lands to developed uses poses a great threat to global terrestrial biodiversity. Natural resource managers, tasked with managing wildlife as a public trust, require techniques for predicting&nbsp;</span><i>how much</i><span>&nbsp;and&nbsp;</span><i>where</i><span>&nbsp;wildlife habitat is likely to be converted in the future. Here, we develop a methodology to&nbsp;estimate the “social carrying capacity for development” – </span><i>SK_d</i><span> – for 251 towns across the state of Vermont, USA. </span><i>SK_d</i><span> represents town residents’ minimum acceptable human population size and level of development within town boundaries. To estimate </span><i>SK_d</i><span> across towns within the state of Vermont (USA), as well as the average state-wide </span><i>SK_d</i><span>, we administered a visual preference survey (</span><i>n</i><span>&nbsp;=&nbsp;1505 responses) to Vermont residents, and asked respondents to rate alternative landuse scenarios in a fictional Vermont town on a scale of +4 (highly acceptable) to −4 (highly unacceptable). We additionally collected demographic data such as age and income, as well as ancillary information such as participation in town-planning meetings and location of residence. We used model selection and AIC to fit a cubic function to the response data, allowing us&nbsp;to estimate </span><i>SK_d</i><span>&nbsp;at a town scale based on town demographic characteristics. On average, Vermonters had a&nbsp;</span><i>SK_d</i><span>&nbsp;of 9.1% development on the landscape; this estimate is 68% higher than year 2000 levels for development (5.4%). Respondents indicated that management action to curb development was appropriate at 9.4% development (roughly the statewide </span><i>SK_d</i><span> average). Management by local, regional, and state levels were considered acceptable for curbing development while federal level management of development was considered unacceptable. Given a scenario where development levels were at </span><i>SK_d</i><span>, we predicted a 16,753&nbsp;km</span>²<span> reduction in forested land (−11.16%) and a 1038&nbsp;km</span>²<span> reduction in farmland (−60.45%). Such changes would dramatically alter biodiversity patterns state-wide. In a companion paper, we estimate how these changes would affect the distribution of wildlife species.</span></p> application/pdf 10.1016/j.biocon.2013.07.009 en Elsevier Normative standards for land use in Vermont: Implications for biodiversity article