Land Use in the Wildland-Urban Interface: Urban Sprawl and Smart Growth

The occupation or reservation of land or water area for any human activity or any defined purpose. It also includes use of the air space above the land or water.

Urban ecology is defined as the study of structure, dynamics, and processes in urban ecological systems. Urban ecology is the study of the relationships of human and nonhuman organisms in urban areas, the interactions of these organisms with the native and built physical environment, and the effects of these relationships on the fluxes of energy, materials, and information within individual urban systems and between urban and nonurban systems.

The common area where human settlements and built structures are intermixed and/or adjacent to undeveloped land in which the vegetation is permitted to grow without significant human interference.

Note: In March 2021, the UF/IFAS School of Forest Resources and Conservation (SFRC) changed its name to the School of Forest, Fisheries, and Geomatics Sciences (FFGS). Older publications will still use the older name.