Mapping the Future of Urban Sprawl

Increasingly sophisticated computer programs have allowed researchers to document changes in the natural environment of the West like never before; they've also opened the door to modeling future scenarios, projecting what the land will look like in a generation or two by crunching critical data about population shifts, zoning laws, watersheds, wildlife migration corridors, and so on. "We've gotten pretty good at depicting the demise of habitat and telling that story," Theobald says. "Now the question is, 'What should we do? What are our options?' That's where a lot of GIS work is going."

Geographers, planning experts, biologists and others at universities across the country are now seeking to map the future of the West while debating the best ways to protect its natural treasures from ruin. More than most of them, perhaps, Theobald has brought his views and research to the public sphere, trying to engage bureaucrats, conservation groups and development interests in the discussion. He's worked with the U.S. Forest Service, the EPA and other federal agencies, prepared an analysis of growth scenarios for Ouray County leaders, and taken his concerns about biodiversity to public forums around the state.

"He takes a lot of grief," says University of Colorado geography professor Bill Travis, who served as advisor on Theobald's doctorate and has worked with him on several projects since. "The academic life is a lot more comfortable. If you engage, you will run into the tensions society feels over development. If you're the messenger — and Dave often is — you will be the focus of that ire and concern. But being driven by the results is an important part of what it means to be an academic. The difference with Dave is, he's still willing to go to the land-use meetings and present the results."

Rick Knight, a professor of wildlife conservation at CSU who's known Theobald since his graduate-student days and has taught courses with him, describes him as one of several dynamic young instructors in the university's Warner College of Natural Resources who are "meta-disciplinarians" — that is, they bring a range of experiences and interests to their work and can't be pigeonholed as simply geographers or biologists. But Theobald's willingness to bring his skills to land-use debates truly sets him apart, Knight says, both in and outside of the classroom. "He comes across as highly relevant, someone who knows from firsthand experience whereof he speaks," he explains. "Higher education doesn't reward that kind of behavior, but he genuinely wants to walk the talk. He wants to see if his research has a sense of legitimacy when it's presented to the public."

Knight regards Theobald as one of a select pantheon of Colorado scholars, such as CU's Patricia Limerick and Charles Wilkinson, whose work can influence public policy. "I wish we had more people like him," he says. "I have told people that I think Dave is the single most important lever in conservation that works today in Colorado. He's easily in the top five in having an impact on sustainable land uses."

Most scientific disciplines are "value-laden," Theobald says, and being passionate about the changes facing the landscape is deeply connected to his work. "I believe that biodiversity is very important, and that I have to provide a voice for resources and creatures that are threatened," he says. "But I have a responsibility to do that work in a careful manner.

"It's very important to do the work properly. But it's also important to engage the stakeholders — the landowners, the planners, the developers, the Sierra Club, the citizens. That's where science has done a pitifully poor job. We need to come up with collaborative solutions. Science is there to provide options. Where values are involved, science is just part of the process."

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Growing up in Greenwood Village in the 1970s, Dave Theobald never had a strong sense of being connected to the land around him. But one of his most vivid memories is of walking to school through open fields. He walked a mile and a half each way, every day, from second grade through his senior year at Cherry Creek High School. When he was small, the fields were full of the song of meadowlarks in the spring. By the end of his junior year, the birds were gone; new subdivisions had arrived, and his neighborhood was no longer on the fringe of something wild.

"If I hadn't been doing the same thing for ten years, I probably wouldn't have noticed that change," he says. "We're not very good at gradual change. We're wired to respond to immediate problems."