Estimating Historically Cleared and Forested Land in Massachusetts, USA, Using Airborne LiDAR and Archival Records

In the northeastern United States, widespread deforestation occurred during the 17-19th centuries as a result of Euro-American agricultural activity. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, much of this agricultural landscape was reforested as the region experienced industrialization and farmland became abandoned. Many previous studies have addressed these landscape changes, but the primary method for estimating the amount and distribution of cleared and forested land during this time period has been using archival records. This study estimates areas of cleared and forested land using historical land use features extracted from airborne LiDAR data and compares these estimates to those from 19th century archival maps and agricultural census records for several towns in Massachusetts, a state in the northeastern United States. Results expand on previous studies in adjacent areas, and demonstrate that features representative of historical deforestation identified in LiDAR data can be reliably used as a proxy to estimate the spatial extents and area of cleared and forested land in Massachusetts and elsewhere in the northeastern United States. Results also demonstrate limitations to this methodology which can be mitigated through an understanding of the surficial geology of the region as well as sources of error in archival materials.

Automated summary

This study estimated the areas of cleared and forested land in Massachusetts during historical periods using LiDAR data, comparing the results with archival maps and agricultural census records. The findings indicate that LiDAR data can be reliably used as a proxy for estimating land changes, but also highlight the limitations of this methodology.