Investigating alternative land use/habitat conservation strategies using GIS and optimization modeling

Our proposal intends to explore a future phase of the Alameda/Contra Costa Biodiversity project by development of a tool for considering all land uses and assigning values that can be used in solving for an "optimum" allocation of the limited land resources of the study area. We expect that the kinds of spatially explicit data considered in a model will include locations of wildlife habitat and sensitive species, wetlands, ranches and farms, infrastructure (power lines, water facilities), areas of future development, roads, etc. Through the expertise of our team we will establish values and/or constraints on lands that will limit the range of solutions appropriately. We also, as a primary consideration, intend to build flexibility into the process, allowing alteration of each or any of the land values and the constraints placed on them. We want to be able to take this tool and demonstrate it to any interested party, being able to make adjustments that they may like to see for illustrative purposes.