Land use and land cover (LULC) was mapped using historical aerial photos (1940) and contemporary QuickBird satellite imagery (2003) for a 100 km2 area covering portions of Erie Township, Michigan, and Toledo, Ohio on the western end of Lake Erie. This area serves as a microcosm of conditions elsewhere on the Great Lakes coast, containing a range of human-altered to natural landscapes. Geographic information system analysis was used to measure LULC change within the study area based on the 1940 and 2003 maps, and to illustrate the use of historical aerial photos and data to quantify changes in anthropogenic pressures to coastal ecosystems. Agriculture was and is the main land use in the study site, constituting 78% and 55% of upland [...]
