Land-use Planning Regions:
TOTAL AREA:
83,004 km2
TOTAL Human Footprint:
23,225 km2
Region Overview
The Upper Athabasca Region covers 83,004 km2 or 12.5% of the province in northwest central Alberta. Forest ecosystems cover most of the landbase, including the Boreal Forest (44%), Foothills (38%), and Rocky Mountain (17%) Natural Regions. Forestry is an important economic driver with several Forest Management Agreement (FMA) areas overlapping the regional boundary. In addition, recreation and tourism are key industries; Jasper National Park—a world-renowned tourist destination—coincides with this region. Human footprint status and trends are summarized for the Upper Athabasca Region.
Status
As of 2021, human footprint occupied 31.7% of the Upper Athabasca Region. Agriculture was the dominant human footprint, covering 13.8% of the land base, followed closely by forestry footprint at 12.3%. Energy footprint covered 2.1% of the region, and transportation and urban/industrial footprints each covered 1.7% of the region.
| Human Footprint Type | Area (km2) | Area (%) |
|---|
Figure: Status of Human Footprint. Summary of percentage cover of total human footprint broken down by human footprint category in the Upper Athabasca Region, circa 2021.
Trend
- Between 2000 and 2021, the total area of human footprint in the Upper Athabasca Region increased by 7.8 percentage points, from 23.9% to 31.7%.
- This increase in human footprint was driven by the expansion of forestry footprint, which almost doubled in size during this time from 6.0% to 12.3%. However, this increase in forestry footprint is lower when forest recovery is considered: forestry footprint increased by 3.7 percentage points (4.9% to 8.6%) when recovery of regenerating forest is included.
- The remaining human footprint categories each had small increases of < 1.0 percentage point between 2000 and 2021.
| Human Footprint Type | 2000 (km2) | 2021 (km2) | Change (km2) |
|---|
| Human Footprint Type | 2000 (%) | 2021 (%) | Change (%) |
|---|
Figure: Trend in Human Footprint. Trend in the percentage area of total human footprint, and by human footprint category in the Upper Athabasca Region between 2000 and 2021. Click on the entries in the legend to turn human footprint categories on and off.
Status of Linear Human Footprint
- Density of linear features was 3.3 km/km2 in the Upper Athabasca Region.
- Conventional seismic lines, with a density of 2.2 km/km2, were the predominant line type, representing 66.7% of linear footprint in the region.
- Density of pipelines (0.4 km/km2) and roads (0.6 km/km2) represented 12.1% and 18.2% of linear footprint, respectively, in the Upper Athabasca Region.
- Transmission lines and railways had very low densities in the region.
| Type | Density (km/km2) |
|---|
Figure: Status of Linear Human Footprint. Density (km/km2) of linear features in the Upper Athabasca Region, circa 2021, overall and broken down by linear feature type. Hover over bar or legend to view density of specific linear feature type. Please note low impact seismic lines are not included in the summary of linear footprint density.