environment
Forest cover
Why this matters
Forest cover measures how much of the land is covered by trees and forest ecosystems. It is usually shown as a share of total land area, based on satellite images and on-the-ground surveys.
Forests do a lot of quiet work. They filter the air and drinking water, soak up rainfall to reduce flooding, and store carbon that would otherwise warm the climate. They also provide homes for most land animals and places for people to hike and relax. In a fast-growing region like Charlotte, forests near towns are especially valuable for shade and cooler temperatures.
Tracking forest cover over time shows whether an area is keeping its natural lands or losing them.
About the Charlotte region
This explorer covers the 14-county, two-state Charlotte region (11 North Carolina and 3 South Carolina counties). Many of these indicators connect to a defining regional story: a landmark Harvard study ranked Charlotte last, 50th of the 50 largest U.S. metros for economic mobility (a child raised in the poorest fifth had about a 4.4% chance of reaching the top fifth), a finding that launched the region's Leading on Opportunity agenda. Updated 2024 data show Charlotte has since climbed to 38th.
Opportunity here is also unevenly mapped. An affluent “wedge” fanning southeast from uptown holds a large majority of the city's wealth on under a quarter of its land, while a ”crescent” to the north, west, and east carries higher poverty, a legacy of redlining, exclusionary zoning, and highway routing that recurs across the race, income, health, tree-canopy, and school maps in this tool. No single indicator is good or bad on its own; together they describe how the region sorted opportunity.
Companion resources: Charlotte-Mecklenburg Quality of Life Explorer · UNC Charlotte Urban Institute · Opportunity Atlas · Methods & sources
Learn more
- USDA Forest Service — Forest Inventory and Analysis research.fs.usda.gov
The nation’s official forest census, tracking how much forest exists and how it changes.
- U.S. EPA — Report on the Environment: Land Cover cfpub.epa.gov
National acreage of forest and other land types and recent change.
- The Nature Conservancy — How We Conserve Forests nature.org
Why forests matter for wildlife, clean water, and storing carbon.
About the data
Derived from the USGS National Land Cover Database (2001–2021), a 30-metre satellite land-cover product. Tract values are area-weighted zonal statistics (exact pixel fractions) of the classified raster. As a wall-to-wall classification it carries no sampling margin of error.
Source: U.S. Geological Survey, National Land Cover Database (NLCD).