Metro Conservation Corridors

Ensuring that people and nature in the Twin Cities Area can grow together for generations to come.

Urgent need The pressure on the Twin Cities Areas remaining natural lands is intensifying, with one million more people and 500,000 more households coming to the area in the next 30 years. Each day, nearly 60 acres of fields, forests and wetlands in the metro area lost to development. Protection and restoration of key natural lands will help maintain the quality of life in the region. And with land values rising dramatically in the metro area, investment today is critical.

Accelerated, coordinated and efficient action

This project will accelerate protection and restoration of key natural lands in the metro area by:

• Focusing pro-actively on strategic areas. (See the map of focus areas (2,621 K) Note this is a large file and will take time to download on slower connections.)
  Download the GIS data.
• Efficiently leveraging private and public partners and resources
• Building upon prior investments in public lands, and
• Enhancing the cost-effectiveness of conservation efforts by coordinating them within a regional framework.

Building a successful habitat network

This project will acquire and restore a habitat network in the Twin Cities Metropolitan Area to protect and improve the health of native vegetation, fish and wildlife species. It builds upon important work already completed. The project will:

1. Establish priorities, coordinate work by the partner organizations and focus on areas with greatest regional importance for habitat. Using state-of-the-art natural resource assessments and regional prioritization, we will work in core habitat areas, establish habitat corridors, create buffers for existing protected land and increase public access to nature-related recreation.
2. Protect and restore priority natural lands in focus areas:
   • Restore habitat on up to 1,700 acres of private and public land.
   • Protect land by acquiring fee title and conservation easements from willing landowners on about 600 acres.