New York State Economic Development Board Land Use and Natural Resources Inventory and Land Related Information System Land Use…

Grouped by type of map (LUNR, LRIS, etc.), then numerical by map number or alphabetical by quadrangle name.

In 1966 Governor Rockefeller directed the Office of Planning Coordination to conduct a natural resource inventory of New York State. The result was the Land Use and Natural Resources (LUNR) Inventory.

Between 1967 and 1968 a contractor completed aerial photography of Upstate New York; New York City and Long Island were photographed in 1969-1970. The state also contracted with Cornell University's Center for Aerial Photographic Studies to design the inventory, conduct the photointerpretation (coding), and produce overlay maps from the coded aerial photographs showing land use over the entire state. The inventory used standard 7.5' United States Geological Survey/New York State Department of Transportation quadrangle maps as the base maps for the overlays.

In 1974, the LUNR Inventory was updated for Delaware, Greene, Otsego, Schoharie, Sullivan, Ulster and Albany (part) counties. The Office of Planning Services (successor to the Office of Planning Coordination) then made plans to refine and update the entire LUNR Inventory. A pilot project for this program, called Land Related Information System (LRIS), was carried out from 1974-1977, resulting in photography and mapping of Broome and Tioga counties.

Starting in 1976, the program was administered by the Economic Development Board. Although planning continued into 1978, no further work was done on LRIS.

The bulk of this series consists of overlay maps produced for land use analysis and planning by government and private planning, development, and conservation agencies. The overlays are approximately 2' x 3'. Most of the overlays in this series are transparent diazo film; a few are opaque paper prints.

Two types of overlays were produced for each quadrangle. Area data overlays provide the outlines of areas in which any of 51 types of land use was present. A code symbol in each outlined area indicates the type of land use in that area. Major land use categories include: agricultural land (orchards, vineyard, etc.); commercial/industrial land (central business districts, shopping centers, resorts, etc.); mining; forest land; outdoor recreation areas; public/semi-public land; residential area; transportation land use; water resources; and non-productive land.

Point data overlays include up to 79 categories of land use identified as specific points on the overlays. Most of these categories are comprised of objects of importance to statisticians and project planners, such as specialty farm headquarters, various types of rural residences, mobile homes, outdoor recreation facilities, schools, solid waste disposal sites, and others.

Land Use and Natural Resources (LUNR) Inventory records in this series include: area data overlays for the entire state; point data overlays (only a small number of these are included); time study overlays and maps. These were produced from prints made from previous aerial photography done in 1938, 1951, 1955, 1958, and 1964. The maps show changing land use over time in the Elmira-Corning and Rochester (southeastern Monroe County) regions; updated LUNR area and point data overlays (1974) for quadrangles in Catskill area counties (Delaware, Greene, Otsego, Schoharie, Sullivan, Ulster, and the towns of Berne, Knox, Westerlo, Coeymans, New Scotland, and Rensselaerville in Albany County). These overlays were produced for the Temporary State Commission to Study the Catskills, which from 1971-1975 studied and made recommendations for the conservation and development of the region's natural, cultural, and recreational resources; and Universal Transverse Mercator (UTM) grid index maps. The UTM grid is comprised of one-square-kilometer cells. The UTM grid coordinates were used for automated storage and retrieval of land use data: area data was stored as a percentage of each grid cell; point data was stored as a count of units (e.g. the number of residences) per grid cell.

Land Related Information System (LRIS) records in this series include: 1) area and point data overlays from Broome and Tioga counties (including final originals and a set of copies); 2) orthophotograph prints for Broome, Tioga, and Cortland counties, and orthophotonegatives from Cortland County (although Cortland County was an LRIS Pilot Project county, no maps were produced for it). Orthophotographs are high-altitude photographs scanned by computer to produce orthophotograph maps. Additional materials filed with orthophotographs for the Binghamton East, Binghamton West, and Endicott (Broome County) quadrangles include planimetric maps showing transportation data such as roads, trails, railroads, airfields, and ferry lines, plus municipal, county, and reservation boundaries, state and federal lands, and some individual buildings; and opographic maps showing the Planimetric map features plus elevation contours from the corresponding U.S.G.S. maps; and 3) Broome County Land Use Change Maps using color coding to show areas of changed land use as of 1977.

The series also includes soil map overlays and a Generalized Soil Map of New York (11 sheets plus an index sheet) showing major soil types throughout the state. The maps and overlays were produced by the U.S. Soil Conservation Service for the Temporary State Commission to Study the Catskills.

B1109-94: This accretion consists of copies of Land Related Information System (LRIS) land use overlay maps prepared for the Office of Planning Services by Cornell University by an "Appalachian Regional Commission Grant, 1974." The exact date of production is not known, but work on LRIS overlays for counties included in this accretion was continued through 1977. Done to a scale of 1:24,000, the overlays cover localities in Broom, Cortland, Chemung, Chenango, Delaware, Oswego, Tioga, and Tompkins counties.

B1107Series B1107, Land Use and Natural Resources Inventory and Land Related Information System Research, Planning, and Use Files, and

B1052Series B1052, Land Use and Natural Resources Inventory and Land Related Information System Aerial Photographs, contain related records.

Card index provides numerical access to LUNR overlays; an alphabetical index provides access by quadrangle name.

Folder list and land use classification manuals (provide key to land use coding schemes) are available at the repository.

B1109-94: A memorandum accompanying this accretion states that the overlays were sent to the Department of Economic Development's Division of Policy and Research in 1993 by Cornell University. The reason they were sent is not given. They might duplicate originals previously transferred to the State Archives, or they might be originals which were inadvertently left behind.

There are no restrictions regarding access to or use of this material.