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Harvard Forest Data Archive

HF367

Mid-19th Century Land Use on the Southern New England and New York Coasts 1832-1886

Related Publications

Data

  • hf367-01: Long Island to Block Island, buildings
  • hf367-02: Long Island to Block Island, roads
  • hf367-03: Long Island to Block Island, land use/land cover
  • hf367-04: coastal MA, survey coverage
  • hf367-05: coastal MA, roads
  • hf367-06: coastal MA, land use/land cover
  • hf367-07: coastal MA, buildings
  • hf367-08: coastal MA, region where buildings were not digitized
  • hf367-09: outer Cape Cod, fences
  • hf367-10: Martha's Vineyard, fences

Overview

  • Lead: David Foster, Glenn Motzkin, Brian Hall
  • Investigators: Robert Eberhardt, Jon Harrod, Dana MacDonald, Tim Parshall, Betsy Von Holle
  • Contact: Information Manager
  • Start date: 1832
  • End date: 1886
  • Status: complete
  • Location: Southern New England Coast, New York Coast
  • Latitude: +40.7 to +42.0 degrees
  • Longitude: -74.0 to -70.1 degrees
  • Elevation: 0 to 118 meter
  • Datum: WGS84
  • Taxa:
  • Release date: 2023
  • Language: English
  • EML file: knb-lter-hfr.367.5
  • DOI: digital object identifier
  • EDI: data package
  • DataONE: data package
  • Related links:
  • Study type: historical
  • Research topic: biodiversity studies; conservation and management; historical and retrospective studies
  • LTER core area: disturbance patterns, land use and land cover change, human-environment interactions
  • Keywords: geographic information systems, land cover, land use, management, maps, spatial vector
  • Abstract:

    The widespread influence of land use and natural disturbance on population, community, and landscape dynamics and the long-term legacy of disturbance on modern ecosystems requires that a historical, broad-scale perspective become an integral part of modern ecological studies and conservation assessment and planning. In previous studies, the Harvard Forest Long Term Ecological Research (LTER) program has developed an integrated approach of paleoecological and historical reconstruction, meteorological modeling, air photo interpretation, GIS analyses, and field studies of vegetation and soils, to address fundamental ecological questions concerning the rates, direction, and causes of vegetation change, to evaluate controls over modern species and community distributions and landscape patterns, and to provide critical background for conservation and restoration planning. In the current study, we extend this approach to investigate the link between landscape history and the abundance, distribution, and dynamics of species, communities and landscapes of the Cape Cod to Long Island coastal region, including the islands of Martha's Vineyard, Nantucket, and Block Island. The study region includes many areas of high conservation priority that are linked geographically, historically, and ecologically.

    This data package includes GIS layers digitized by Harvard Forest researchers from copies of the US Coastal Survey “T-Sheet” maps available from the National Archives in College Park, Maryland. The US Coastal Survey, and then the US Coast and Geodetic Survey mapped the region, or specific parts of it, several times between 1832 and the 1960s. In this project we digitized the earliest T-Sheet available for each location. The original maps were surveyed between 1832 and 1886, with most of them made between 1835 to 1855. The original maps showed features such as roads, farm walls, railroads, buildings, some industrial buildings, saltworks, wharfs, and land cover including woodlands, sandplains, grasslands, open agricultural fields, cultivated areas, fruit tree orchards, wetlands, etc. Many sheets had symbols which differentiated conifer trees from hardwoods. There were some inconsistencies in what features were mapped or how they were drawn between the original T-Sheets. Since we digitized the maps over the course of several different research projects, we did not always digitize all of the same features in each geographic area, therefore users of this data are encouraged to look at scans of the original T-Sheets for their specific areas of interest (links below). We always digitized land cover and roads and occasionally buildings and fences as mentioned in the datasets below.

  • Methods:

    Photocopies of each selected T-Sheet were obtained from the National Archives in College Park Maryland and converted to GIS layers using a digitizing table. Extant road intersections and latitude/longitude tics drawn on the T-Sheets were used for georeferencing during the digitizing. No other georeferencing was done except for Martha’s Vineyard, MA where all GIS layers’ spatial locations were refined via rubbersheeting with 646 control links. Not all features in all subregions were digitized. Land cover, roads, and buildings were digitized from Long Island, NY to Block Island, RI, and coastal Massachusetts. Fences and pine symbols on parts of coastal Massachusetts were also digitized in subsequent local studies.

    Researchers can download high-resolution copies of the original T-Sheet maps from: https://nosimagery.noaa.gov/images/shoreline_surveys/survey_scans/NOAA_Shoreline_Survey_Scans.html

    The identification number and date of each T-sheet can be seen at: https://shoreline.noaa.gov/_pdf/Tsheet_index1.pdf

    hf367-01-long-island-block-island-buildings.zip

    This layer contains buildings from Long Island to Block Island. Projection is NAD1927, UTM Zone 18N.

    hf367-02-long-island-block-island-roads.zip

    This layer contains roads and some railroads (identified in the notes field) from Long Island to Block Island. Projection is NAD1927, UTM Zone 18N.

    hf367-03-long-island-block-island-lulc.zip

    This layer contains land use/ land cover from Long Island to Block Island. Projection is NAD1927, UTM Zone 18N. LU_Text – a short description of the land cover type. For the “special” type, see the NOTES field for more information.

    hf367-04-coastal-mass-survey-region.zip

    The US Coastal Survey was primarily concerned with coastlines and harbors, so they did not always map far away from the coastline as was the case on most of Cape Cod. This layer shows the coverage of the earliest T-Sheets for the coastal Massachusetts portion of the study. Projection is Massachusetts State Plane, NAD83, Meters.

    hf367-05-coastal-mass-roads.zip

    This layer contains roads in the coastal Massachusetts portion of the study. Projection is Massachusetts State Plane, NAD83, Meters.

    hf367-06-coastal-mass-lulc.zip

    This layer contains land use/land cover in the coastal Massachusetts portion of the study. Projection is Massachusetts State Plane, NAD83, Meters. LULC_TEXT is a description of the landcover as inferred by researchers from the original T-Sheets. Types of landcover include:

    cultivated in 1860 (MV only) – a larger-scale manuscript map for Martha’s Vineyard was located which featured cultivated fields not definitively shown on the earlier T-Sheets; these were added to the land use/ land cover map.

    Since the the USCS series apparently had a larger minimal mapping size than typically found in modern GIS layers, some waterbodies and wetlands from a modern GIS layer were added to the land use/land cover layer during a separate Martha’s Vineyard project. These include:

    swamp, inferred (MV only) - in an effort to have the most precise and complete landcover map for Martha’s Vineyard, any modern wetland from the MassGIS DEC 1:12,000 scale wetland layer that was in a mid-19th C. woodland was considered to be a swamp.

    wetland, herb., inferred (MV only) - in an effort to have the most precise and complete landcover map for Martha’s Vineyard, any modern wetland from the MassGIS DEC 1:12,000 scale wetland layer that was in a mid-19th C. open area was considered to be a herbaceous wetland.

    water, inferred (MV Only) - in an effort to have the most precise and complete landcover map for Martha’s Vineyard, any modern waterbody from the MassGIS DEC 1:12,000 scale wetland layer that was not shown on the mid-19th C. map was considered to be an unmapped waterbody.

    hf367-07-coastal-mass-buildings-selected.zip

    This layer contains buildings in selected portions of the coastal Massachusetts portion of the study. This layer only shows buildings on Martha’s Vineyard, Nantucket, the town of Falmouth, and the outer portion of Cape Cod. Please see hf367-08-coastal-mass-buildings-not-digitized.zip for polygon of the areas where buildings were NOT digitized. Projection is Massachusetts State Plane, NAD83, Meters.

    hf367-08-coastal-mass-buildings-not-digitized.zip

    This layer contains the portions of the coastal Massachusetts study region where buildings were not digitized. Projection is Massachusetts State Plane, NAD83, Meters.

    hf367-09-coastal-mass-outer-cc-fences.zip

    This layer contains fences on outer Cape Cod. The NOTES field states if the line is fence, if it goes along a road, or if it is a “natural fenceline” such as a pond or wetland edge. Projection is Massachusetts State Plane, NAD83, Meters.

    hf367-10-coastal-mass-mv-fences.zip

    This layer contains fences on Martha’s Vineyard. The TYPE field states if the line is only fence, or if it is along a road. Projection is Massachusetts State Plane, NAD83, Meters.

  • Organization: Harvard Forest. 324 North Main Street, Petersham, MA 01366, USA. Phone (978) 724-3302. Fax (978) 724-3595.

  • Project: The Harvard Forest Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) program examines ecological dynamics in the New England region resulting from natural disturbances, environmental change, and human impacts. (ROR).

  • Funding: National Science Foundation LTER grants: DEB-8811764, DEB-9411975, DEB-0080592, DEB-0620443, DEB-1237491, DEB-1832210.

  • Use: This dataset is released to the public under Creative Commons CC0 1.0 (No Rights Reserved). Please keep the dataset creators informed of any plans to use the dataset. Consultation with the original investigators is strongly encouraged. Publications and data products that make use of the dataset should include proper acknowledgement.

  • License: Creative Commons Zero v1.0 Universal (CC0-1.0)

  • Citation: Foster D, Motzkin G, Hall B. 2023. Mid-19th Century Land Use on the Southern New England and New York Coasts 1832-1886. Harvard Forest Data Archive: HF367 (v.5). Environmental Data Initiative: https://doi.org/10.6073/pasta/5b54b802e68dc752b39ac0f532753936.

Detailed Metadata

hf367-01: Long Island to Block Island, buildings

  • Compression: zip
  • Format: Esri shapefile
  • Type: vector GIS

hf367-02: Long Island to Block Island, roads

  • Compression: zip
  • Format: Esri shapefile
  • Type: vector GIS

hf367-03: Long Island to Block Island, land use/land cover

  • Compression: zip
  • Format: Esri shapefile
  • Type: vector GIS

hf367-04: coastal MA, survey coverage

  • Compression: zip
  • Format: Esri shapefile
  • Type: vector GIS

hf367-05: coastal MA, roads

  • Compression: zip
  • Format: Esri shapefile
  • Type: vector GIS

hf367-06: coastal MA, land use/land cover

  • Compression: zip
  • Format: Esri shapefile
  • Type: vector GIS

hf367-07: coastal MA, buildings

  • Compression: zip
  • Format: Esri shapefile
  • Type: vector GIS

hf367-08: coastal MA, region where buildings were not digitized

  • Compression: zip
  • Format: Esri shapefile
  • Type: vector GIS

hf367-09: outer Cape Cod, fences

  • Compression: zip
  • Format: Esri shapefile
  • Type: vector GIS

hf367-10: Martha's Vineyard, fences

  • Compression: zip
  • Format: Esri shapefile
  • Type: vector GIS