Atlantic County Land Use Analysis with a Focus on Pleasantville City

By: Kailey Howard

ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES (ENVL 4300)

SPRING 2024

STOCKTON UNIVERSITY
ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE AND GEOLOGY PROGRAM
Instructor: Dr. Tait Chirenje
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Abstract

Land use refers to the various ways in which a specific area of land is utilized by human

activities. By analyzing land use changes and trends in certain areas, we can gain valuable

insights that can help us understand urbanization patterns, and serve as a foundation for future

planning. In this report, data from 1986 to 2012 were analyzed to create maps, charts, and graphs

to further analyze the land use changes and trends in Atlantic County and Pleasantville City. The

land use types were categorized as: urban land, forest, water, wetlands, agriculture, and barren

land. In Pleasantville City, the biggest noticeable changes from 1986 to 2012 included: an urban

increase from 2039.3 to 2316.2 acres, an agriculture decrease from 1.3 acres to 0 acres, a forest

decrease from 471.7 acres to 221.6 acres, and a barren land decrease from 61.6 acres to 6 acres.

The changes in land use are most likely attributed to population growth and the need for

expanded infrastructure to accommodate the increasing population. Such infrastructure would

include the construction of more housing, grocery stores, and schools- consequently contributing

to the decrease in agricultural, forest, and barren land acreage.

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Table of contents

1. Abstract ……..…………….……………………………………………………… 1

2. Introduction ……………….……………………………………………………… 3

3. Methods ……………….……………………………………………………… 4

4. Results ……………….……………………………………………………… 5

a. Section 1: Atlantic County …………………………………………………. 5

b. Section 2: Pleasantville City ……………………………………………….. 7

5. Conclusion ……………….……………………………………………………… 11

6. Reference List ……………….……………………………………………………… 12

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Introduction

According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, “Land use” is the term used to

describe the human use of land, and it represents the economic and cultural activities that are

practiced at a given place. Land use analysis can be a valuable tool as it provides insights into

historic land use changes and can be used to help plan for the future in a sustainable manner.

Overtime, changes in land use reflect the shifts in population dynamics- this can be seen in

growing populations as barren land decreases and urbanization increases. This insight is valuable

information when it comes to urban planning, environmental management, and policymaking. In

regions dealing with growing populations- such as New Jersey- this information becomes

valuable as expanding urbanization must be balanced with our environmental necessities in order

to ensure sustainability.

On the county and municipal scale, analyzing land use changes over time is vital for

decision making in urban planning and resource management. In the case of Atlantic County,

New Jersey, it has a population of 274,000 with a median age of 42 and a median household

income of $66,473 (Data USA). The population in 2022 was 275,000, which grew 0.4% from the

274,000 population in 2010 (link). Over this 12 year period, it is likely that urbanization

increased while barren lands or forests decreased in order to accommodate for the 0.4%

population growth. Pleasantville City, a suburban community in south New Jersey, has a

population of 21,000 and is currently growing at a rate of 0.2% annually (USAFacts).

Pleasantville most likely faced similar land use changes as Atlantic County as they both have a

modest annual growth rate. However, it is important to note that the city of Pleasantville has

been undergoing an aggressive redevelopment program in order to promote business relations

with Atlantic City and meet the challenges of rapid economic growth (Britannica). Since the city
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of Pleasantville puts an emphasis and resources towards improving quality of life for residents

and business, it is likely most of the recent land use changes to be due to urbanization.

Methods

In this report, data was provided by the New Jersey Department of Environmental

Protection website to analyze land use changes and trends for both Atlantic County and

Pleasantville City for the years 1986, 2002, 2007, 2012, 2015, and 2020. All data was used to

create a geodatabase in ArcGIS Pro for further analysis. For analysis of both locations, land use

type was categorized into the following categories: urban (residential, commercial, recreational,

industrial, etc.), agriculture (cropland and pasture, orchards, etc.), forest (deciduous, coniferous,

etc.), water (river channels, lakes, ponds, reservoirs, bays, estuaries, and bogs), wetlands (saline

marshes, freshwater tidal marshes, and vegetated dune communities), and barren land (beaches,

bare exposed rock, extractive mining, etc.).

Geoprocessing tools were used to merge together feature classes for each desired year

and clipped to the boundaries of both the Atlantic County feature class and Pleasantville City

feature class. Table to Excel was used to export the geodatabase into an excel spreadsheet to

calculate total land use acreage per land use category for each of the desired years.

To further analyze the changes in both regions, maps were created in ArcGIS Pro to

visually display the land use over the years. Symbology was used to help compare the known

locations over time. The land use type symbology was uniformly applied to all maps: urban= red,

water= blue, forest= dark green, agriculture= light green, barren land= brown, and wetlands=

yellow.
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Results and Discussion

Section 1: Atlantic County

From 1986 to 2012, Atlantic County experienced an increase in urban land use (Figure

1). Notably, it was found that over the years barren land and wetlands land use in Atlantic

County showed the largest decrease in acreage as shown in brown and yellow. (Figure 2).

Figure 1: Maps of Atlantic County Land Use for the years of 1986, 2002, 2007, 2012, 2015,
2020.
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ATLANTIC COUNTY (ACRES)

LU 1986 2002 2007 2012 2015 2020
Category

Urban 2224478290 59482.74024 66095.46186 67666.0526 68131.08219 69218.09275

Agric 1217551558 26178.45078 25542.86201 25136.39289 25549.33428 24880.84558

Wetlands 5262007849 123929.6778 122842.0325 122677.9943 122979.2552 121979.6513

Forest 6568430562 144584.9008 140172.0941 139156.9263 138596.4978 138056.9057

Barren 209858012. 4291.242264 2952.890175 2591.160833 3116.313967 2772.241591

4

Water 1547664216 94609.69977 115690.0381 360329.3658 376320.5407 372311.0232

Figure 2: Acreage of the six land type categories for Atlantic County for the years of 1986, 2002,
2007, 2012, 2015, 2020.
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Section 2: Pleasantville City

From 1986 to 2012, Pleasantville City experienced an 100% decrease in agricultural land

use between 1986 to 2002 and no subsequent recovery in any agricultural land as the years

progressed (Figure 3, Figure 4). Another significant observation is the decline in forest land use

during the same period, reflecting on a net loss of 230 acres (Figure 5). It can be concluded that

these reductions were likely compensated by the substantial increase in urban land use, with a net

gain of 3449 acres (Figure 5).

Figure 3: 1986 Pleasantville City Land Use

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Figure 4: 2020 Pleasantville City Land Use

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PLEASANTVILLE CITY (ACRES)

LU 1986 2002 2007 2012 2015 2020
Category

Urban 6968.79 2780.269465 2899.801253 2955.936065 3786.180203 3519.086199

Agric 6.48 0 0 0 0 0

Wetlands 2098.19 2010.784548 1992.223815 1956.821953 1964.709972 1942.749308

Forest 499.07 369.0604598 323.9975176 300.6932896 284.0491132 268.6795834

Barren 93.55 48.43891685 21.27670345 18.01050706 38.04178449 14.18087594

Water 31992.83 3104.933082 3123.394378 2968.392732 3120.966133 3131.71235

Figure 5: Acreage of the six land type categories for Pleasantville City for the years of 1986,
2002, 2007, 2012, 2015, 2020.
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A further look into the land use changes in Pleasantville City between 1986 and 2012

highlights a decline in agricultural, forested, and barren land, accompanied by the seemingly

related increase in urban acreage. Forest land diminished by a little bit more than half, with a

53.08% decrease , while barren land experienced a 90.16% decrease, and agriculture experienced

a total 100% decrease. However, wetlands and water acreage stayed relatively the same

throughout the time period (Figure 6).

Figure 6: Pie graph comparing land uses of Pleasantville city in the years 1986 (left) and 2012
(right).
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Conclusion

In conclusion, by looking at the changes in land use throughout the years of 1986 to 2012

in Atlantic County and Pleasantville City show similarities in their patterns of transformation.

For both locations, as urban land use emerges as the years go on, there is a synchronous decrease

in agricultural, forested, and barren land. This can be especially highlighted in the instance of

Pleasantville City, which can be seen to lose 100% of the agricultural land use and more than

50% of the forested land use. These findings show exactly how land use change reflects how

cities and even counties evolve throughout the years. We can see the obvious correlation between

urban land use with growing population and the corresponding decrease in other land use types

in order to accommodate for the expansion.

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Reference List

NJDEP, Dep.nj.gov. (n.d.). https://dep.nj.gov/

Environmental Protection Agency. (n.d.). EPA.

https://www.epa.gov/report-environment/land-use#:~:text=“Land%20use”%20is%20the

20 term,frequently%20represent%20very%20different%20uses.

Pleasantville, NJ. Data USA. (n.d.). https://datausa.io/profile/geo/pleasantville-nj

Encyclopædia Britannica, inc. (2024, February 12). New Jersey. Encyclopædia Britannica.

https://www.britannica.com/place/New-Jersey

Atlantic County, NJ population by year, race, & more. USAFacts. (2024, February 11).

https://usafacts.org/data/topics/people-society/population-and-demographics/our-chagi

ng-population/state/new-jersey/county/atlantic-county/