A Strategic Plan for Accelerating Economic Development in Maryland - 2016

as required in §2.5-202 of the Economic Development Article

Maryland Land Preservation and Recreation Plan 2019-2023

The 2019 Land Preservation and Recreation Plan is a resource and a guide for strategically enhancing public outdoor recreation opportunities statewide over the next five years.

Certified Land Preservation Programs

The Certified Land Preservation Program is state and local partnership to create local land preservation programs and continually improve them.

Forest Service

The Forest Service restores, manages, and protects Maryland’s trees, forests, and forested ecosystems to sustain our natural resources and connect people to the land.

Land Acquisition and Planning Programs

The Department of Natural Resources Land Acquisition and Planning Unit works to advance land conservation and outdoor recreational opportunities in Maryland.

Rural Legacy Areas

The Rural Legacy Program was created in 1997 to protect large, contiguous tracts of Maryland's most precious cultural and natural resource lands through grants made to local applicants.

Targeted Ecological Areas

The GreenPrint map displays Targeted Ecological Areas (TEAs), lands and watersheds of high ecological value that have been identified as conservation priorities by the Maryland Department of Natural Resources (DNR).

Climate Leadership Academy

The Maryland Climate Leadership Academy will advance the capacity of state and local government agencies, infrastructure organizations and businesses to develop and implement sound climate change initiatives thus ensuring current and future public health, security and economic prosperity.

Program Open Space - Local

Program Open Space – Local provides financial and technical assistance to local subdivisions for the planning, acquisition, and/or development of recreation land or open space areas.

Program Open Space - Stateside

Program Open Space Stateside preserves natural areas for public recreation and watershed and wildlife protection across Maryland through the purchase of fee-simple and easement acquisitions. Fee simple purchases are managed by the department as State Parks, Forests, and Wildlife and Fisheries Management Areas.

Ecosystem Services

The benefits people gain from the environment can be collectively referred to as Ecosystem Services, which are commonly divided into four major categories: provisioning services (e.g. timber, firewood, food), regulating services (e.g. water purification, wildlife habitat), supporting services (e.g. nutrient cycling, soil formation) and cultural services (e.g. recreation, spiritual benefits.

Maryland Growth & Conservation Analysis Tool

The Growth and Conservation Overlay interactive map shows local and state targeted growth and conservation areas for coordinated planning, management and resource allocation. The purpose of these areas is to identify where and how local and state government, as well as the private sector, can work together to achieve common goals.

Maryland Land Use / Land Cover 2010

The Land Use & Cover map and data is used to show development trends on the landscape in Maryland.

Maryland Protected Lands Dashboard

The Maryland land preservation dashboard is designed to let you assess the current status of Maryland's land preservation efforts and to access the tabular data that informs the dashboard as well as available land preservation GIS data.

Maryland's Green Infrastructure Assessment

The Green Infrastructure Assessment (GIA), based on principles of landscape ecology and conservation biology, identified an ecological network using satellite imagery to characterize land cover, Geographic Information System (GIS) data on road, stream, wetland and other resource features, and biological databases.

Transfer of Development Rights Programs

Maryland Department of Planning provides outreach, education, technical assistance and analysis support to local governments on Transfer of Development Rights (TDR) programs.