Assessing the local economic impacts of land protection

• DOI: 10.1111/cobi.13318
• Publication Date: 2019-03-26T11:44:37Z
• Authors: Katharine R. E. Sims; Jonathan R. Thompson; Spencer R. Meyer; Christoph Nolte; Joshua S. Plisinski
• Keywords: Amenity

Abstract Land protection, whether public or private, is often controversial at the local level because residents worry about lost economic activity. We used panel data and a quasi‐experimental impact‐evaluation approach to determine how key indicators were related percentage of land protected. Specifically, we estimated impacts private protection based on area employment housing permits from 5 periods spanning 1990–2015 for all major towns cities in New England. To generate rigorous impact estimates, modeled outcomes as function protected prior period, conditional town fixed effects, metro‐region trends, controls period neighboring protection. Contrary narratives that conservation depresses growth, was associated with modest increase number people employed labor force did not affect new permits, population, median income. Public led different patterns positive distances close far cities, indicating importance investing both types opportunities. The greatest magnitude due more rural areas, where opportunities visitation amenity‐related growth may be greatest. Overall, provide novel evidence can compatible illustrate method broadly applied assess net