1 / 28

Amenity Value of Proximity to National Wildlife Refuges

Amenity Value of Proximity to National Wildlife Refuges. Timothy Hamilton North Carolina State University Camp Resources XVIII. National Wildlife Refuges. 502 NWRs in the lower 48 states Operations = $362m, Maintenance = $140m ~ 40 million visitors each year Most open to public

len
Download Presentation

Amenity Value of Proximity to National Wildlife Refuges

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript


  1. Amenity Value of Proximity to National Wildlife Refuges Timothy Hamilton North Carolina State University Camp Resources XVIII

  2. National Wildlife Refuges • 502 NWRs in the lower 48 states • Operations = $362m, Maintenance = $140m • ~ 40 million visitors each year • Most open to public • 70% have hiking/walking trails • 60% have visitor facilities • 50% open fishing and hunting • 70% offer educational programs • Habitat conservation

  3. Management Problem • NWR establishment removes land from the tax base. • FWS pays $1.65 per acre • By comparison, Cape May refuge in NJ. Average home value/acre implies $1,732 per acre in property tax revenue.

  4. Management Problem • However, NWRs provide local communities benefits: • Ecological functions • Recreation benefits to larger community • Localized property value impacts • Proximity to NWR may increase value of nearby homes  increases tax base • Quantification of these benefits continues to be a key challenge for federal agencies

  5. Hedonic Valuation • There are dozens of hedonic estimates of the capitalization value of proximity to open space: • Permanent vs. agricultural and/or developable open space • Boyle, Paterson and Poor (2002); Neumann, Boyle and Bell (2009) • Case-study of four NWRs (one near an UA, two more remote) • Obtain transaction data • Hedonic analysis of sales data to determine value of proximity to NWR • 4.8% increase for homes in the urbanized area; significantly less for non-urbanized area.

  6. Hedonic Valuation • Broader programmatic approach desired • Census Microdata offers an opportunity to consider broad geographic models • Davis (2011) • Proximity to power plants • Use census microdata across the U.S. • Rabindran and Timmins (2011) • Proximity to superfund site • Use both census and transaction data

  7. Study Area • Begin with GIS of all NWR boundaries • Overlay with GIS of all urbanized areas (UA) • Contiguous, densely settled census blocks/groups that meet minimum population density requirements (1,000 people/sq.mile, 500 in surrounding blocks) • NWR boundary must be within two miles of the boundary of an UA (188)

  8. Study Area, continued • Final sample must also have: • NWR established in 1999 or earlier • Final Sample: 90 NWRs • Northeast: 34 • Southeast: 20

  9. Link NWRs to Census Blocks • Census geography is defined as: • Block: smallest geography available • Typically defined by geography • Population taken into consideration • Census data links household to blocks

  10. Proximity to an NWR • Linear distance between census block centroid and NWR boundary is measured • Each census survey is linked to the block in which the house is located

  11. Housing Data • Confidential Census Data: decennial census long-form with block identifier • One-in-six sample of entire U.S. • Housing characteristics • Housing type, age of structure, total # rooms, bedrooms, heating type, parcel size (<1, 1-9, >10 acres) • Housing value • Owner-report, 24 categories.

  12. Basic Model • Xi = housing/household characteristics • Zb= block characteristics • Kg= neighborhood/block group characteristics • Db = distance of block centroid to NWR • Fixed effects by NWR and tracts

  13. Model Covariates • Housing Characteristics • # of rooms and bedrooms, lot size, age of house • Block Characteristics: GIS • Proximity of a block to: • Nearest Interstate Highway • Nearest national or state park • Coastline • Urbanized area boundary • Centroid of the nearest MSA

  14. Model Covariates • Other open space • 2001 National Land Cover Database • Based on satellite imagery in 30-meter pixels • Calculate % of each census block in each land classification calculated. • 29 land use categories aggregated to: • % open water • % developed open space • % developed low, medium or high density • % forest • % shrub/grassland

  15. Model Covariates • Neighborhood/Block Group Characteristics • Population density • Median family size • Median number of children 18 and under • Median number of adults over 65 • Median household income • % Owner occupied • % Vacant for seasonal use • % Single family detached • % Apartment

  16. Impact of Distance to NWR • Continuous Distance • d(Db) = β1Db + β2(Db)2 • Discrete Intervals • d(Db) = β1I[0,.5] + β2I(.5,1] + β3I(1,1.5] + β4I(1.5,2] + β5I(2,2.5] • Omit dummy for block > 2.5 miles from NWR

  17. NE Results

  18. NE Results: Categorical Distance

  19. SE Results

  20. SE Results: Categorical Distance

  21. NE Results: Illustrative Marginal Effects • Assume value of $250,000 • Categorical model (3 miles to NWR, 8 miles to UA): • Adjacent houses are valued $9,125 higher than those 2.5 - 3.0 miles away. • Continuous Model (3 miles to NWR, 8 miles to UA): • Moving house from 0.25 to 1.25 miles decreases value by $10,775

  22. Summary • NWRs appear to provide amenity values as expected • Amenity impact is highly localized (≤0.5 miles). Census track or even block-group data may not be refined enough to identify impacts. Access to block-level data important. • Amenity value tends to be higher for homes closer to densely populated area

  23. Policy Implications • Programmatic approach to benefits estimation • Transactions data not available and case-study approach can be difficult for agencies to apply broadly in their programs • Additional tax revenue from (particular) NWR • Calculate average capitalized value across all homes • Using average acres per home, find average increase in tax revenue per acre

  24. Policy Implications: Total Capitalized Value for Homes within 8 miles • NE: Total Capitalized Benefits of $55 million across 9 NWRs • Annual tax revenue increase of $69 per acre • SE: Total Capitalized Benefits of $100 million across 21 NWRs • Annual tax revenue increase of $40 per acre

  25. Thank You • Questions? Comments?

More Related