Landscape-scale alterations that accompany urbanization may negatively affect the population structure of wildlife species such as freshwater turtles. Changes to nesting sites and higher mortality rates due to vehicular collisions and increased predator populations may particularly affect immature turtles and mature female turtles. We hypothesized that the proportions of adult female and immature turtles in a population will negatively correlate with landscape urbanization. As a collaborative effort of the Ecological Research as Education Network (EREN), we sampled freshwater turtle populations in 11 states across the central and eastern United States. Contrary to expectations, we found a significant positive relationship between proportions of mature female painted turtles (Chrysemys picta) and urbanization. We did not detect a relationship between urbanization and proportions of immature turtles. Urbanization may alter the thermal environment of nesting sites such that more females are produced as urbanization increases. Our approach of creating a collaborative network of scientists and students at undergraduate institutions proved valuable in terms of testing our hypothesis over a large spatial scale while also allowing students to gain hands-on experience in conservation science.

No abstract

Since the early 2000s, academic research on equity and justice has become an increasingly integral component of transportation planning and policy-making. Less research, however, has focused specifically on the intersection of equity, justice, and active transportation (i.e. cycling and walking). This Viewpoint builds on some of the key concerns and barriers associated with active transportation for disadvantaged groups, especially but not exclusively in relation to planning culture and processes, policing, harassment and racism, and gentrification and displacement. We investigate how issues of equity and justice can worsen the conditions that often prevent or diminish one's capability or desire to engage in active transportation. By providing a better understanding of the deep intersectionalities of equity, justice, and the physical and social barriers to active transportation, our hope is that this Viewpoint helps to improve how such barriers can be recognised and overcome, and the opportunities for change can be understood, centred, and implemented at the policy and planning level.