Forest canopy cover and land use in four Eastern United States cities

Abstract

Four cities in the eastern United States were divided into ten land-use classes and measured for canopy cover with black-and-white, monoscopic aerial photographs. Mean citywide canopy cover is 24–37%, with a range of 5–60% for the mean canopy coverage of ten land uses. Available space for growing trees is 55–66% of the sample cities' area; the percentage of that space filled with canopy is 37–57%. The dominant land-use class, one- and two-family residential covering an average of 46% of the cities' area, shows little variation in both canopy cover and canopy stocking within the sample and, where available growing space increases, so does canopy stocking. Vacant land is second in areal coverage (14% of cities' area), and varies only moderately in canopy cover and stocking when the values in this class are divided into abandoned and undeveloped land. Regularities in the spatial distribution of canopy, among the sample cities, occur as a result of the location and extent of land use.