Land-use Planning Regions:

TOTAL AREA:
83,774 km2

TOTAL Human Footprint:
44,333 km2

Region Overview

The South Saskatchewan Region encompasses nearly 84,000 km2 (13% of the province) in southern Alberta. The Grassland Natural Region is the largest ecosystem, representing 78% of the landbase; the Rocky Mountain (15%), Foothills (2%), and Parkland (5%) Natural Regions all cover much smaller areas. The South Saskatchewan Region has been transformed over the past century because of agricultural production and human settlement. Despite this conversion, large areas of native grassland still remain. Other important industries in the region include energy development, forestry, and tourism and recreation. Human footprint status and trends are summarized for the South Saskatchewan Region.

Status

As of 2023, human footprint occupied in the South Saskatchewan Region.

Covering 43.6% of the region, agriculture was the dominant human footprint. The remaining human footprint types, in decreasing order of area, were transportation (2.9%), urban/industrial (2.2%), energy (1.7%), forestry (1.3%), and human-created water bodies (1.1%).

Human Footprint Type Area (km2) Area (%)
Due to rounding errors and/or small amounts of human footprint that cannot currently be assigned to a reporting category, the sum of the individual human footprint reporting categories may not equal the total human footprint value.

Figure: Status of Human Footprint. Summary of percentage cover of total human footprint broken down by human footprint category in the South Saskatchewan Region, circa 2023.

Legend
Figure: Map of Human Footprint. Status of human footprint by sector in the South Saskatchewan Region (circa 2023). Click on sectors in the Legend to turn different footprint types on and off. Zoom into map for a detailed view of the distribution of human footprint. This map can be explored in more detail in the ABMI Mapping Portal.

Trend

  • Between 2000 and 2023, the total area of human footprint in the South Saskatchewan Region
  • Most footprint types showed small increases in percent area of the South Saskatchewan Region: forestry (+0.7%), urban/industrial (+0.6%), energy (+0.5%), transportation (+0.3%), and human-created water bodies (+0.1%).
Human Footprint Type 2000 (km2) 2023 (km2) Change (km2)
Human Footprint Type 2000 (%) 2023 (%) Change (%)

Figure: Trend in Human Footprint. Trend in the percentage area of total human footprint, and by human footprint category in the South Saskatchewan Region between 1950 and 2023. 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 in the South Saskatchewan Region.
  • Roads, with a density of 1.2 km/km2, were the most common linear feature, followed by other linear features (0.4 km/km2) and pipeline corridors (0.3 km/km2).
  • Transmission lines and railways had very low densities in the region.

Figure: Status of Linear Human Footprint. Density (km/km2) of linear features in the South Saskatchewan Region, circa 2023, overall and broken down by linear feature type. Hover over bar or legend to view density of specific linear feature type. Please note that linear density reporting excludes seismic line types that are not consistently represented provincially, including: Seismic Line of Sight, Low Impact Seismic, Seismic Conventional (Modern), Seismic Avoidance, and unconfirmed seismic lines.

Legend
Figure: Map of Linear Human Footprint. Status of linear features, by line type, in the South Saskatchewan Region, circa 2023. Click on line types in the Legend to turn on and off. Zoom into map for a detailed view of the distribution of linear features. This map can be explored in more detail in the ABMI Mapping Portal.