Protected Areas Database of the United States (PAD-US) 2.1 Spatial Analysis and Statistics

Spatial analysis and statistical summaries of the Protected Areas Database of the United States (PAD-US) provide land managers and decision makers with a general assessment of management intent for biodiversity protection, natural resource management, and recreation access across the nation. This data release presents results from statistical summaries of the PAD-US 2.1 protection status for various land unit boundaries (Protected Areas Database of the United States (PAD-US) Summary Statistics by GAP Status Code) as well as summaries of public access status (Public Access Statistics), provided in Microsoft Excel readable workbooks, the vector GIS analysis files and scripts used to complete the summaries, and raster GIS analysis files for combination with other raster data. The PAD-US 2.1 Combined Fee, Designation, Easement feature class in the full inventory (with Military Lands and Tribal Areas from the Proclamation and Other Planning Boundaries feature class) was modified to prioritize and remove overlapping management designations, limiting overestimation in protection status or public access statistics and to support user needs for vector and raster analysis data. Analysis files were clipped to the Census State boundary file to define the extent and fill in areas (largely private land) outside the PAD-US, providing a common denominator for statistical summaries.