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Human Dimensions Research

Three basic questions underlie the WALTER fire initiatives and the FCS-1 model:

• What role does human activity play in the development of particular forms of fire hazard in natural ecosystems?

• What non-spatial institutional and sociocultural factors must decision makers take into account when managing for fires affecting natural ecosystems?

• How do these factors interact with the other project elements to produce particular types and levels of wildfire and of fire hazard?

Human activities have undeniable impacts on the location and intensity of wildfires. Likewise wildland fires can have heavy impacts on human structures and values. These human dimensions can be divided into three topical areas: statutes and policies, human-environment interactions, and human values placed on landscape and land use. FCS-1 includes variables representing human dimensions of fire risk. These variables are aggregated in the values-at-risk sub-model.

As an adjunct to FCS-1, information about statutes and policies relevant to strategic wildland fire management, such as the Endangered Species Act, National Fire Plan, and Clean Air Act, appear on an interactive section of the WALTER web site.

Social and Institutional Policies

Building a good decision support model for strategic planning for wildfire management requires a fundamental understanding of institutional factors that may facilitate or impede use of the model. It also requires knowledge about how decisions are made, what issues are of most concern to potential users of the model, and what levels of expertise exist with regard to using relatively complex GIS systems. This study includes structured interactions with managers and the public in the four study areas to answer these questions. In addition, a review of laws, policies, reports on previous fires, and other such sources will be conducted to understand how these factors influence current decision-making processes and to predict how institutions may influence use of FCS-1 and the fire simulations that the model produces. The survey and literature reviews will also provide insights needed to design workshop and training sessions to be carried out in tandem with the introduction of the model to decision makers and community members in the four study sites.

Human-Environmental Interaction

Delineating relations between humans and the environment is an essential component of FCS-1. GIS layers are being built that depict the evolution over the past twenty years of land tenure and land use patterns, roads, trails, campsites, water tanks, power lines, and other important spatial variables within the study areas. Once the database has been developed, fire start locations can be correlated with these human parameters, such as the relationship between road density and wildfires caused by humans in a particular area. Combining a variety of these types of analysis, a probability surface for human caused wildfires could be constructed and in turn integrated with the other components of FCS-1.

Human Values Placed on Landscape and Land Use

The final consideration for the human dimension component is the value humans place on landscape and land use. Difficult to quantify or even to understand, there are many personal and social considerations that work together to form our opinions of landscape and land use. Furthermore, these values vary from area to area, and from person to person. One person may be interested strictly in extractive economic value, while another may be most interested in view, or spiritual considerations.

These values, no matter how they are assigned, have important consequences for wildlands. Assigning values to landscape, FCS-1 will allow managers to determine in advance those areas that require the most intensive efforts at fuel reduction, fire remediation, etc., allowing them to concentrate resources in those areas. The model will use a variety of data to assign monetary and non-monetary values that reflect the importance of land use and landscape to both public and scientific communities.