Success in preserving historic rural landscapes under various policy measures: Incentives, restrictions or planning?

Petr Sklenicka, Blanka Kottová and Miroslav Šálek

Environmental Science & Policy, 2017, vol. 75, issue C, 1-9

Abstract: Historic rural landscapes are valuable not only as artefacts and as cultural heritage, but also as natural sites with great scenic qualities. Unfortunately, the total area of these landscapes was dramatically reduced in the course of the second half of the 20th century. In our study, we focus on the development of 38 fragments of medieval hedgerow-defined field patterns in Czechia referred to as pluzina, in an attempt to reveal significant determinants of their persistence or disappearance between 1996 and 2016. Using patch-scale spatial data generated from GIS, mixed-effect modelling was performed to test for the effects of five local drivers and their first-order interactions in explaining the variation of the preservation rate of these features. The study reveals a trend towards a slight decrease in the total area of these valuable field patterns. However, the trends vary greatly from area to area. This reflects not only the influence of natural determinants but also a significant effect of land-use policy measures in individual areas over the study period.

Keywords: Rural landscape; Historical field patterns; Bocage landscape; Intensification; Land abandonment; Hedgerows (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:enscpo:v:75:y:2017:i:c:p:1-9

DOI: 10.1016/j.envsci.2017.05.010

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