Conservation of natural areas checklist Conservation of natural areas checklist

Checklist to use as a tool to better site design (early on and throughout the design process) for development, redevelopment and retrofits. Place a check in the appropriate boxes if you think this approach will work in your site.
Link to this table

Check box	Checklist item
	Create a variable width, naturally vegetated buffer system along all perennial streams and other water features that encompasses critical environmental features such as the 100-year floodplain, steep slopes and freshwater wetlands.
	Preserve or restore riparian stream buffers with native vegetation. Maintain the buffer system through the plan review delineation, construction, and post-development stages.
	Limit clearing and grading of forests and native vegetation at a site to the minimum area needed to build lots, allow access, and provide fire protection. Manage a fixed portion of any community open space as protected green space in a consolidated manner.
	Conserve trees and other vegetation at each site by planting additional vegetation, clustering tree areas, and promoting the use of native plants. Wherever practical, manage community open space, street rights-of-way, parking lot islands, and other landscaped areas.
	Encourage incentives and flexibility in the form of density compensation, buffer averaging,property tax reduction, stormwater credits, and open space development to promote conservation of stream buffers, forests, meadows, and other areas of environmental value. In addition, encourage off-site mitigation consistent with locally adopted watershed plans.
	Prevent the discharge of unmanaged stormwater from new stormwater outfalls into wetlands, sole-source aquifers, or ecologically sensitive areas.