Residential location and the biophysical environment: exurban development agents in a heterogeneous landscape

Agent-based models offer a promising framework for analyzing interactions between agents and a heterogeneous landscape. Researchers have identified a complex of factors that influence exurban development, including demographic shifts and location attractiveness of natural amenities as a magnet to amenity-seeking migrants. Attractiveness is often defined in terms of local or on-lot amenities, including scenic views, the availability of natural features, and low levels of noise. However, exurban-growth models have not fully incorporated a fundamental insight of this literature, that the location behavior of exurban residents is sensitive to fine-grained variations in their biophysical environment. In this study we evaluate how agents and households operate in exurban environments and respond to biophysical features. We simulate household decisionmaking in terms of preferences for features such as site accessibility, two-dimensional amenities, and three-dimensional scenic views. Our results show that, as we build two-dimensional and three-dimensional landscape layers, our model captures the characteristics of landscape change with increasing accuracy. This approach has considerable potential to improve our ability to describe development dynamics in heterogeneous land markets.