Description: The USGS Protected Areas Database of the United States (PAD-US) is the nation's inventory of protected areas, including public land and voluntarily provided private protected areas, identified as an A-16 National Geospatial Data Asset in the Cadastre Theme ( https://ngda-cadastre-geoplatform.hub.arcgis.com/ ). The PAD-US is an ongoing project with several published versions of a spatial database including areas dedicated to the preservation of biological diversity, and other natural (including extraction), recreational, or cultural uses, managed for these purposes through legal or other effective means.
The database was originally designed to support biodiversity assessments; however, its scope expanded in recent years to include all open space public and nonprofit lands and waters. Most are public lands owned in fee (the owner of the property has full and irrevocable ownership of the land); however, permanent and long-term easements, leases, agreements, Congressional (e.g. 'Wilderness Area'), Executive (e.g. 'National Monument'), and administrative designations (e.g., 'Area of Critical Environmental Concern') documented in agency management plans are also included. The PAD-US strives to be a complete inventory of U.S. public land and other protected areas, compiling “best available” data provided by managing agencies and organizations. PAD-US provides a full inventory geodatabase, spatial analysis, statistics, data downloads, web services, poster maps, and data submissions included in efforts to track global progress toward biodiversity protection.
PAD-US integrates spatial data to ensure public lands and other protected areas from all jurisdictions are represented. PAD-US version 4.1 includes new and updated data from the following data providers. All other data were transferred from previous versions of PAD-US.
Federal updates - USGS remains committed to updating federal fee owned lands data and major designation changes in regular PAD-US updates, where authoritative data provided directly by managing agencies are available or alternative data sources are recommended. Revisions associated with the federal estate in this version include updates to the Federal estate (fee ownership parcels, easement interest, management designations, and proclamation boundaries), with authoritative data from two agencies, the Department of Defense (DOD) and the U.S. Forest Service (USFS). Additionally, unit names were updated to reflect recent name changes to Fort Benning, Fort Bragg, and Jocelyn Nungaray National Wildlife Refuge. The federal theme in PAD-US is developed in close collaboration with the Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC) Federal Lands Working Group (FLWG, https://ngda-gov-units-geoplatform.hub.arcgis.com/pages/federal-lands-workgroup/ ). This includes improved the representation of boundaries and attributes for the National Park Service, U.S. Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service lands, in collaboration with agency data-stewards, in response to feedback from the PAD-US Team and stakeholders.
State Updates - USGS is committed to building capacity in the state data steward network and the PAD-US Team to increase the frequency of state land and NGO partner updates, as resources allow. State Lands Workgroup (SLWG, https://ngda-gov-units-geoplatform.hub.arcgis.com/pages/state-lands-workgroup ) is focused on improving protected land inventories in PAD-US, increase update efficiency, and facilitate local review. This version includes updates and additions from the following two states: Texas (state, local, and nonprofit fee) and Arizona (state, local, and nonprofit fee). All state and NGO easement submissions are provided to NCED. For more information regarding the PAD-US dataset please visit, https://www.usgs.gov/programs/gap-analysis-project/science/protected-areas.
For more information regarding the PAD-US dataset please visit, https://www.usgs.gov/programs/gap-analysis-project/science/protected-areas . For more information about data aggregation please review the PAD-US Data Manual available at https://www.usgs.gov/programs/gap-analysis-project/pad-us-data-manual .
A version history of PAD-US updates is summarized below (See https://www.usgs.gov/programs/gap-analysis-project/pad-us-data-history/ for more information):
1) First posted - April 2009 (Version 1.0 - available from the PAD-US: Team pad-us@usgs.gov).
2) Revised - May 2010 (Version 1.1 - available from the PAD-US: Team pad-us@usgs.gov).
3) Revised - April 2011 (Version 1.2 - available from the PAD-US: Team pad-us@usgs.gov).
4) Revised - November 2012 (Version 1.3) https://doi.org/10.5066/F79Z92XD
5) Revised - May 2016 (Version 1.4) https://doi.org/10.5066/F7G73BSZ
6) Revised - September 2018 (Version 2.0) https://doi.org/10.5066/P955KPLE
7) Revised - September 2020 (Version 2.1) https://doi.org/10.5066/P92QM3NT
8) Revised - January 2022 (Version 3.0) https://doi.org/10.5066/P9Q9LQ4B
9) Revised - April 2024 (Version 4.0) https://doi.org/10.5066/P96WBCHS
10) Revised - March 2025 (Version 4.1) https://doi.org/10.5066/P96WBCHS
Comparing protected area trends between PAD-US versions is not recommended without consultation with USGS as many changes reflect improvements to agency and organization GIS systems, or conservation and recreation measure classification, rather than actual changes in protected area acquisition on the ground.
Copyright Text: U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Gap Analysis Project (GAP), 2025, Protected Areas Database of the United States (PAD-US) 4.1: U.S. Geological Survey data release, https://doi.org/10.5066/P96WBCHS