LEAM
simulations show future land-use patterns that occur as a consequence of
the interaction among a variety of factors: economic and demographic trends,
probability of land-use change, and public policy and investment choices.
At the same time, the environmental, economic, and social impacts of these
land-use patterns are assessed so that comparisons can be made among these
land-use patterns.
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First,
simulations are made with a limited set of drivers that use national
data sets. Then, the inadequacies of these simulations indicate what
additional drivers are needed to capture land-use change in the local
region. As more drivers are added, and as the weights assigned to drivers
are adjusted, the model better captures known land-use change (between
1992 and 2000). Drivers are adjusted to produce different land-use scenarios.
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