Eastern Wildway^©

A conservation network for the East: long in coming, now growing

For years, conservationists have envisioned a network of lands in Eastern North America connecting the Acadian forests of Maritime Canada to the Everglades in Florida. In the 1920s, Benton MacKaye envisioned an expansive Appalachian Trail composed of a network of “braided” trails running the length of the Appalachian spine. Maps of an eastern corridor drawn in the early 1990s captured the imaginations of a young generation of conservationists and influenced conservation planning at the state, provincial and regional levels for the next 15 years.

Since then, “landscape connectivity” – a connected system of conservation lands – has become widely recognized as essential for long-term ecological viability and wildlife survival, and with this recognition has come renewed interest in making a continental corridor from Québec to Florida, an Eastern “Wildway,” a reality. Learning from its extensive work in the Northern Appalachian Corridor, Wildlands Network is spearheading the effort to build the Eastern Wildway starting with its recent TrekEast awareness campaign.

The Eastern Wildway has some of North America’s most beloved national parks, preserves, forests, scenic rivers and wild places. From the wilderness of Québec, the Adirondacks, and the Shenandoah, to the wilds of the Great Smoky Mountains and Everglades National Park, this continental corridor traverses a wide array of ecoregions including: the Northern and Central Appalachians, the High Allegheny Plateau, the Southern Blue Ridge and Tropical Florida. Its mountains and valleys, forests and farmlands span climates from arctic to tropical. The species diversity is accordingly great, from predators such as wolf, marten and cougar, to prey such as moose and deer. Many plants, birds, fish, and butterflies are endemic -- found nowhere else in the world --particularly in the southeastern United States.

First the bad news: while advanced conservation planning, data analysis, and mapping has occurred throughout the Eastern Wildway, these efforts have not kept pace with the conservation challenges. The mountain chains in the East are within such close proximity to mega-population centers that development has come to places once thought remote. Montreal, Québec City, Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Washington, DC, and Atlanta are all within a few hours drive of the center of the Wildway.

Complicating matters, as rural economies continue to stagnate, private landowners are selling large land parcels. The economy is shifting as hundreds of pastoral agricultural holdings and timberlands come on the market. Many people flocking to the mountains build second homes, retirement communities and the roads to get there, thereby destroying the very natural environment they seek.

Many wildlife species of the Eastern Wildway are in jeopardy, as roads and development, poor farming and logging practices, fire suppression, exotic species, resource extraction and a lack of significant conservation land protections takes its toll. Many predators have disappeared from the landscape. Populations of species such as black bear and beaver have dwindled. Wolf and cougar are all but gone. Lack of adequate habitat and diminished prey challenge recovery efforts. In the Southern Appalachians alone, over 190 aquatic species and 50 species of plants and animals are formally listed as either endangered or threatened with extinction.

As concern about habitat fragmentation grew in proportion to increasing population pressures, Wildlands Network Designs and other biodiversity conservation tools, such as ecoregional plans, were created. Still, no singular framework emerged to link these plans and these places to one another to establish a system of interconnected lands—until today.

Now the good news: The Wildlands Network is now spearheading an initiative to connect habitat along the length of eastern North America, from the Everglades of Florida, through the forests of Alabama, along the Appalachian Mountains, to the boreal forests and Maritime Provinces of Canada. This continental-scale wildlife corridor skirts around towns and communities and connects working landscapes and private conservation lands to large public parks and preserves.

Over the course of the next three years, a plan to create this 2,500-mile corridor, the Eastern Wildway, will be developed and resources to implement the plan identified. Priority lands will be targeted; landscape linkages will be pinpointed; the corridor will be mapped in detail through a scientific process; and a coalition of regional partners working on the ground will be formed.

Much of our information gathering is all underway: the boundaries have been identified, many maps of existing conservation work have been collected and integrated into a geographic information system; dozens of organizations and scientists have been contacted and enlisted in the Eastern Wildway effort.

As part of this process, the Wildlands Network is engaging a broader network of conservationists, including the top non-profit organizations and foundations concerned with Eastern biodiversity and the ramifications of climate change. This network works together to incorporate landscape connectivity into their programs and priorities.

Ultimately, it will take collective action at all scales to bring this bold vision to fruition, from creating new conservation lands, reforming policies, and providing incentives for private land stewardship, to working with transportation agencies on wildlife bridges, incorporating smart growth into local plans, and passing new legislation to face contemporary challenges. Ambitious? Absolutely. Necessary? No question! For more information on our Eastern Wildway Program, and our existing work in the Northern Appalachians, contact us at info@wildlandsproject.org.