@article{SelvaKreftKatietal.2011, author = {Selva, Nuria and Kreft, Stefan and Kati, Vassiliki and Schluck, Martin and Jonsson, Bengt-Gunnar and Mihok, Barbara and Okarma, Henryk and Ibisch, Pierre L.}, title = {Roadless and Low-Traffic Areas as Conservation Targets in Europe}, series = {Environmental Management}, volume = {48}, journal = {Environmental Management}, publisher = {Springer Nature}, issn = {0364-152X}, doi = {10.1007/s00267-011-9751-z}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:eb1-opus-4856}, pages = {865 -- 877}, year = {2011}, abstract = {With increasing road encroachment, habitat fragmentation by transport infrastructures has been a serious threat for European biodiversity. Areas with no roads or little traffic ("roadless and low-traffic areas") represent relatively undisturbed natural habitats and functioning ecosystems. They provide many benefits for biodiversity and human societies (e.g., landscape connectivity, barrier against pests and invasions, ecosystem services). Roadless and low-traffic areas, with a lower level of anthropogenic disturbances, are of special relevance in Europe because of their rarity and, in the context of climate change, because of their contribution to higher resilience and buffering capacity within landscape ecosystems. An analysis of European legal instruments illustrates that, although most laws aimed at protecting targets which are inherent to fragmentation, like connectivity, ecosystem processes or integrity, roadless areas are widely neglected as a legal target. A case study in Germany underlines this finding. Although the Natura 2000 network covers a significant proportion of the country (16\%), Natura 2000 sites are highly fragmented and most low-traffic areas (75\%) lie unprotected outside this network. This proportion is even higher for the old Federal States (western Germany), where only 20\% of the low-traffic areas are protected. We propose that the few remaining roadless and low-traffic areas in Europe should be an important focus of conservation efforts; they should be urgently inventoried, included more explicitly in the law and accounted for in transport and urban planning. Considering them as complementary conservation targets would represent a concrete step towards the strengthening and adaptation of the Natura 2000 network to climate change.}, language = {en} } @article{HoffmannOstapowiczBartońetal., author = {Hoffmann, Monika T. and Ostapowicz, Katarzyna and Bartoń, Kamil and Ibisch, Pierre L. and Selva, Nuria}, title = {Mapping roadless areas in regions with contrasting human footprint}, series = {Scientific Reports}, volume = {14}, journal = {Scientific Reports}, number = {1}, publisher = {Nature Publishing Group UK}, address = {London}, issn = {2045-2322}, doi = {10.1038/s41598-024-55283-3}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:eb1-opus-9553}, abstract = {Abstract In an increasingly human- and road-dominated world, the preservation of functional ecosystems has become highly relevant. While the negative ecological impacts of roads on ecosystems are numerous and well documented, roadless areas have been proposed as proxy for functional ecosystems. However, their potential remains underexplored, partly due to the incomplete mapping of roads. We assessed the accuracy of roadless areas identification using freely available road-data in two regions with contrasting levels of anthropogenic influence: boreal Canada and temperate Central Europe (Poland, Slovakia, Czechia, and Hungary). Within randomly selected circular plots (per region and country), we visually examined the completeness of road mapping using OpenStreetMap 2020 and assessed whether human influences affect mapping quality using four variables. In boreal Canada, roads were completely mapped in 3\% of the plots, compared to 40\% in Central Europe. Lower Human Footprint Index and road density values were related to greater incompleteness in road mapping. Roadless areas, defined as areas at least 1 km away from any road, covered 85\% of the surface in boreal Canada (mean size ± s.d. = 272 ± 12,197 km 2 ), compared to only 0.4\% in temperate Central Europe (mean size ± s.d. = 0.6 ± 3.1 km 2 ). By visually interpreting and manually adding unmapped roads in 30 randomly selected roadless areas from each study country, we observed a similar reduction in roadless surface in both Canada and Central Europe (27\% vs 28\%) when all roads were included. This study highlights the urgent need for improved road mapping techniques to support research on roadless areas as conservation targets and surrogates of functional ecosystems.}, subject = {-}, language = {en} } @article{HoffmannOstapowiczBartońetal., author = {Hoffmann, Monika T. and Ostapowicz, Katarzyna and Bartoń, Kamil and Ibisch, Pierre L. and Selva, Nuria}, title = {Author Correction: Mapping roadless areas in regions with contrasting human footprint}, series = {Scientific Reports}, volume = {14}, journal = {Scientific Reports}, number = {1}, publisher = {Nature Publishing Group UK}, address = {London}, issn = {2045-2322}, doi = {10.1038/s41598-024-79802-4}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:eb1-opus-9580}, subject = {-}, language = {en} }