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Linear Land Uses (Roads, Power Lines, and Trails)

Along with urbanization, linear human land uses, such as roads and power lines, are increasingly prevalent in the South. The mortality of wildlife due to vehicle collisions and forest habitat loss are the most obvious impacts of roads on forest wildlife, but an increasing body of information suggests that the effects on wildlife populations are much more complex. About 3.85 million miles of public roads now exist in the United States (Forman 2000). Based on an assumption that some of the ecological effects of roads extend outward for more than 330 feet, Forman estimates that about one-fifth of the U.S. land area is directly affected ecologically by the system of public roads. Several compilations and review papers on the ecological effects of roads are available (Findlay and Bourdages 2000, Forman and Deblinger 2000, National Resources Defense Council 2000, Trombulak and Frissell 2000).

Similarly, power line corridors function in a variety of ways to affect forest wildlife populations. Knight and Kawashima (1993) estimated that there were more than 0.31 million miles of power lines in the United States, covering an estimated 5.2 million acres of land.

Trails also are linear features that bisect forest habitats and can affect sensitive forest plants and wildlife. Outdoor recreation activities are growing in popularity throughout the United States (Miller and others 1998), and recreational opportunities in the South are increasingly concentrated on the relatively small percentage of forested public land (chapter 11). More information about outdoor recreation in southern forests can be found in chapter 11.