Land Change Modeler software extension for ArcGIS

Clark Labs is announced the release of their Land Change Modeler software extension for ESRI’s ArcGIS software. The Land Change Modeler offers tools to assess and predict land cover change and determine the implications of change for ecological sustainability. The software interface is sequentially organized around major task areas:

# Analyzing past land cover change
# Modeling the potential for land transitions
# Predicting the course of change into the future
# Assessing the implications of change for biodiversity
# Evaluating planning interventions for maintaining ecological sustainability

Users can perform a variety of change analyses with two land cover maps of different dates. Along with graphs of gains and losses, net changes and contributions experienced by any category, a user can generate rapid maps of change, persistence, specific transitions and exchanges. A change abstraction tool, based on trend surface analysis, is also provided which allows the user to uncover the underlying trends of complex change.

Clark Labs has been working with the Andes Center for Biodiversity Conservation of Conservation International for several years to develop tools for analyzing and projecting land cover change and its effect on habitat and biodiversity. The scope of the project was subsequently broadened to develop a modeling environment that could be used for a variety of land change scenarios and contexts. Further integration with the ArcGIS software extends the availability and accessibility of such important tools for users focused on land change, conservation and biodiversity.

“Users who are trying to understand land change and secure biodiversity will obtain great value from the Land Change Modeler. One modeling environment contains a variety of analytical tools, eliminating the need to work between multiple applications.” said James Toledano, Executive Director of Clark Labs.

Source : http://www.clarklabs.org