Effects of Land Development on Water Resources of the Pinelands Region

Executive Summary

The purpose of the report is to assess the extent to which water and water-related resources in the Pinelands region are modified by land development, especially since adoption of the Pinelands Comprehensive Management Plan. Land development includes both urban uses (e.g., housing, commercial and industrial, utilities, public facilities, roads) and agricultural uses (e.g., field, orchard and berry crops). To allow for comprehensive evaluations within available resources, the project focuses on three developed areas and one undeveloped area. The three developed areas are: Medford Lakes Borough, Medford Township and Evesham Township; Town of Hammonton; and Tuckerton Borough and Little Egg Harbor Township. The undeveloped area is the watershed of McDonalds Branch, a tributary of the Rancocas Creek in the Brendan T. Byrne State Forest. (See Figures ES-1 through ES-4).

New Jersey is the most developed state in the nation, with 33 percent of its land developed. An additional 46 percent of its land has been permanently preserved or is considered environmentally constrained and hence undevelopable. This leaves only 21 percent of the state’s land area still available for development. Despite this impending build-out, development continues to occur inefficiently, with growth in developed acres outpacing population growth by a factor of 3.7 between 2002 and 2007 (Haase and Lathrop, 2010). These development patterns have taken a toll on New Jersey’s water resources. This pattern of growth, combined with dated water management policies and systems, has degraded water quality and quantity throughout the state, even in places to which it is most desirable to direct growth. Future development threatens to exacerbate the problem, further polluting the waters on which citizens rely on for drinking, recreation and ecosystem health.

New Jersey has taken important steps to protect its water resources. Critical among them is the landmark Pinelands program. Established in 1978 by federal law, the Pinelands National Reserve covers 1.1 million acres comprising 22 percent of New Jersey’s land area, including portions of seven counties and all or part of 56 municipalities, and enormous ground water resources in the Kirkwood-Cohansey Aquifer. New Jersey’s Pinelands Protection Act (1979) established the Pinelands Commission and mandated adoption of a regional Comprehensive Management Plan (CMP) to protect the quality and quantity of water within its borders (the Pinelands Area, which does not include the full National Reserve), in part by guiding the location and intensity of development. Municipal conformance to the plan is mandatory and enforced by the Pinelands Commission. Underlying the Pinelands CMP is the assumption that future growth will be directed to and accommodated in locations that have the necessary infrastructure in place to support development, and away from areas with the highest value environmental resources. The Pinelands CMP is an early example of “smart growth” principles that seek to optimize the benefits of focused development while minimizing harmful impacts.

What this approach may not address adequately are the impacts that such directed development will have on water resources. First, can development, and especially dense development, occur without jeopardizing the quality of the local water resources or the quality of the ecological and man-made systems that rely on adequate supply, and if so, under what conditions? A related issue also must be considered: if less dense development would reduce impacts in the immediate area, would the increased area of development result in greater impacts overall? Second, can a plan focused on future development rectify problems caused by past development? The Pinelands region was not a pristine, undeveloped area when the Pinelands CMP was adopted. Third, to what extent can a plan (the CMP) that includes parts of watersheds along its boundaries protect the overall integrity of those watersheds? The answers to these questions are critical to the long-term ecological health of the Pinelands region.