Historical redlining is associated with increasing geographical disparities in bird biodiversity sampling in the United States

Historic segregation and inequality are critical to understanding modern environmental conditions. Race-based zoning policies, such as redlining in the United States during the 1930s, are associated with racial inequity and adverse multigenerational socioeconomic levels in income and education, and disparate environmental characteristics including tree canopy cover across urban neighbourhoods. Here we quantify the association between redlining and bird biodiversity sampling density and completeness—two critical metrics of biodiversity knowledge—across 195 cities in the United States. We show that historically redlined neighbourhoods remain the most undersampled urban areas for bird biodiversity today, potentially impacting conservation priorities and propagating urban environmental inequities. The disparity in sampling across redlined neighbourhood grades increased by 35.6% over the past 20 years. We identify specific urban areas in need of increased bird biodiversity sampling and discuss possible strategies for reducing uncertainty and increasing equity of sampling of biodiversity in urban areas. Our findings highlight how human behaviour and past social, economic and political conditions not just segregate our built environment but may also leave a lasting mark on the digital information we have about urban biodiversity. In this study of bird biodiversity data from across 195 US cities, Ellis-Soto et al. show that historical redlining is associated with increasing inequality in sampling. Historically redlined neighbourhoods remain the most undersampled areas.