Historic Aerials: Old to New Land Images

[dmccarty]

My imagery only goes back to 1996, 5 years before i bought my place. Checking out my parent's place is more interesting though... it's amazing how much more land is forested now than in 1953 when it was mainly farmland.

I went and looked at the house my grandparents built a lake in central FLA in the mid 70's. Back then the land was more open and know the trees have matured around the lake and it is very hard to see the houses. I would guess most of the houses were built in the 50's and 60's so the trees were not young when my grandparents built and the trees really have gotten larger. Docks and beaches have disappeared due to lack of maintenance and the lake shoreline moved over the years due to rain fall levels. We stopped by the house a few years ago but nobody was home. I wanted to walk back and see the lake. Oh well. Maybe some day.

Years ago I read an article about land use in Wake county NC, which is where the state capital is located. Around 1900, most of the land was farm, city or town. Mostly farm land of course and that makes sense. Towards the 70s and 80s the farm land had drastically turned into forest and the city/towns had expanded but not much. Most of the land was in forest at that point. I forget the percentage but it was huge. Then in the 90's the land was rapidly being turned into towns/city as the huge migration of people moved to NC.

Later,
Dan