western New York Wildway
What is a Wildway?
A wildway is a connected landscape that sustains biodiversity, allows wildlife movement, safeguards water resources, and helps mitigate the effects of climate change. Wildways link forests to create vital pathways for plants and animals to roam freely as they did in the past, connections that are essential for species to adapt to a changing climate.
The WNY Wildway
The Western New York Land Conservancy serves the 8-county area defined as Western New York (Allegany, Cattaraugus, Chautauqua, Erie, Genesee, Niagara, Orleans, and Wyoming). In 2020 we launched the WNY Wildway. The WNY Wildway will be an extensive series of protected lands that connect the vast forests of northern Pennsylvania to the Great Lakes. It will link up with the Eastern Wildway (see map below).
Due to threats from climate change and biodiversity loss, bold landscape-scale conservation is necessary. The WNY Wildway will protect biodiversity across our region, ensuring there are opportunities for all species to thrive, including native plants, insects, amphibians, birds, and mammals.
Why is it Important?
Biodiversity Protection
In his influential 2016 book Half-Earth: Our Planet’s Fight for Life, biologist and author E.O. Wilson argues that if humans conserve half the land and sea, we can save 85% of the world’s biodiversity from extinction. To achieve this goal, we must reduce habitat fragmentation and build corridors of connection between large, wild, protected areas that will allow plants and animals greater movement between them. This will help ensure ecosystems—and everything that lives in them—can thrive in the face of climate change. The Western New York Wildway will deliver on our region’s goal of maintaining healthy natural habitats, while also increasing carbon capture and storage. That’s what we call a win-win.
Climate Change Mitigation
As the climate changes, plants and animals will require corridors that enable them to move to more hospitable landscapes and core habitat areas to make their home.
Due to our region’s plentiful fresh water, productive agricultural soils, and cool climate, experts suggest that Western New York will become a destination for climate migrants in the 21st century. Given this ever-increasing pressure on our natural resources, protecting our region’s natural habitats is more important than ever.
Mapping the WNY Wildway
View the interactive WNY Wildway StoryMap for an in-depth look at this extensive project.
