GIS Based Analysis of Growth Management and Environmental Decline of the Central Mississippi Region

Abstract This paper examines the changing growth patterns along the Central Mississippi Planning District and then offers growth management strategies for ameliorating the situation. To analyze these trends, the project adopts a time series approach and Geographic Information System (GIS) mapping of socio-economic and environmental data from the United States Census across time and space. Existing regional statistics shows that the region has been undergoing some major changes due to growth. The nature of growth in the area is so one dimensional that sustainable growth anchored in ecological economic principles is sacrificed for short-term economic gains. This comes at an era when other counties in the United States are embracing the tenets of sustainable communities as a way of making cities livable for posterity. Not only has the population growth been moving at a geometric progression, but the area's agricultural land base and ecological indicators have experienced a decline over the years.