An Information System for Environmental Planning

Abstract New laws regarding environmental impact evaluation require more careful consideration of physical factors in land use planning. An information system to aid in environmental planning has been developed for San Diego County by the Laboratory for Experimental Design at Cal Poly, Pomona, under a Ford Foundation grant. This information system is based on interactions of location, environmental effects, and developmental actions. The system is designed to identify optimum locations for development on the basis of natural processes, to make qualitative predictions of environmental effects of proposed developments in order to evaluate environmental impact, and to determine what human activities will bring about the least change in natural processes on given land.