Planned environmental corridors reflect planned changes to the existing (year 2000) environmental corridors and isolated natural resource areas. Changes can be either losses or gains. Planned losses to environmental corridors are typically as a result of long-standing commitments by municipalities to allow for urban development in the area concerned. Planned gains to environmental corridors are typically related to areas within the 100-year floodplain that are currently in agricultural use but would be allowed to revert to natural vegetation once agricultural activities cease, thereby creating additions to the corridor area. Planned gains may be due to recommendations contained in sewer service area plans, county park or land use plans, or local park or land use plans.
Environmental corridors and isolated natural resource areas consist of the following 12 natural resource and natural resource-related elements: 1) lakes, rivers, and streams and their associated shorelands and floodplains; 2) wetlands; 3) woodlands; 4) prairies; 5) wildlife habitat areas; 6) wet, poorly drained, or organic soils; 7) rugged terrain and high-relief topography; 8) existing park and open space sites; 9) potential park and open space sites; 10) historic sites; 11) significant scenic areas and vistas; and 12) natural and scientific areas. Primary environmental corridors include a wide variety of these resource and resource-related elements and are at least 400 acres in size, two miles in length, and 200 feet in width. Secondary environmental corridors generally connect with primary environmental corridors, and are at least 100 acres in size and one mile in length. Isolated natural resource areas contain some of these resource and resource-related elements, are separated physically from environmental corridors by intensive urban or agricultural land uses, and are at least five acres in size.
The planned environmental corridor and planned isolated natural resource area polygons are identified by a tag attribute consisting of one of the following codes:
PLANNEDPEC: Primary environmental corridor; PLANNEDSEC: Secondary environmental corridor; PLANNEDINRA: Isolated natural resource area; OUT: Area outside of environmental corridors; 950: Surface water from SEWRPC land use inventory; PLANNEDPEC.950: Surface water inside PLANNEDPEC; PLANNEDSEC.950: Surface water inside PLANNEDSEC; PLANNEDINRA.950: Surface water inside PLANNEDINRA.
The Planned Environmental Corridor Inventory also uses a supplemental suffix code to indicate the reason for planned changes to the corridor areas. The suffix code identifies the type of plan that recommends the planned gains to the environmental corridors and isolated natural resource areas. Supplemental suffix codes are attached to the major tag attributes (PLANNEDPEC, PLANNEDSEC, and PLANNEDINRA) and the water-related tag attributes (PLANNEDPEC.950, PLANNEDSEC.950, and PLANNEDINRA.950). The suffix codes and their descriptions (type of plan recommending planned gains) are defined as follows:
.SSA: Sewer Service Area plan; .CPP: County park plan; .CLP: County land use plan; .LPP: Local park plan; .LLP: Local land use plan.
The digital map files are in ESRI coverage format and shapefile format. All files consist of graphic map features only and do not contain additional attributes at this time.