Effects of road network on Asian elephant habitat and connectivity between the nature reserves in Xishuangbanna, Southwest China

Predicting indirect effects of transportation network expansion on Asian elephants: Implications for environmental impact assessments

“…The rapid TN proliferation in Asia has impacted large mammal populations (Gubbi, Poornesha, & Madhusudan, ; Liu, Dong, et al, ). Asian elephants ( Elephas maximus ) are one of the last remaining endangered megaherbivores, with a large biogeographic distribution (878,639 km 2 ) (Hedges, Fisher, & Rose, ) and home range (29–1,352 km 2 ) (Fernando et al, ; Moßbrucker, Fleming, Imron, Pudyatmoko, & Sumardi, ).…”

“…Asian elephants ( Elephas maximus ) are one of the last remaining endangered megaherbivores, with a large biogeographic distribution (878,639 km 2 ) (Hedges, Fisher, & Rose, ) and home range (29–1,352 km 2 ) (Fernando et al, ; Moßbrucker, Fleming, Imron, Pudyatmoko, & Sumardi, ). Only 29% of their distribution range is legally protected, and most elephants inhabit highly fragmented landscapes in non‐protected areas (Hedges et al, ) where they interact with villagers (AsERSM, ; Perera, ) and are affected by TNs (Gubbi et al, ; Johnsingh & Williams, ; Liu, Dong, et al, ). TNs were identified as a substantial threat to their long‐term population viability especially due to road kill and population isolation.…”

“…Since the recolonization from 1995 to 2015, the spatial interface between elephants and TNs has increased in non‐protected areas (Figure ), but barrier effects remain to be quantified. Furthermore, as a key economic corridor to Southeast Asia in China's Belt and Road Initiative, this region is undergoing a rapid rate of TN expansion (Liu, Dong, et al, ). The Silan Highway (80 kph) and Yumo Railway (160 kph) will be operational by 2020 and 2022, respectively, and the Mengjianglv Highway is currently under EIA.…”

Early warning signals for landscape connectivity and resilient conservation solutions

“…Transformation frequency and intensity exacerbate landscape fragmentation across a range of temporal and spatial scales (Liu et al, ). In this resistance category, the selected types of transportation networks included railways and roads (freeway, national highway, city roads, and others) from the Open Street Map and airports (small, medium, and large) from the OurAirports database.…”

“…Transformation frequency and intensity exacerbate landscape fragmentation across a range of temporal and spatial scales (Liu et al, 2017 were created on both sides of the roads and railways (McClure et al, 2016;Theobald et al, 2012). The last transportation layer, airports, was generated by point data with a buffer zone of 1 km; HI scores were assigned in three classes based on the scale of the airports from small to large.…”