Top 40 Projects – Overview

Saving the best, most endangered coastal lands

The Coastal Land Trust, together with conservation partners and local experts, created a list of the 40 best, most endangered lands that are critical to the health of the North Carolina coast and quality of life in eastern NC. Why? Because we want to save them.

Identifying these “Top 40” most important lands, and committing to the ambitious goal to save them, has accelerated our land protection program and resulted in larger projects with greater impact on the health and vitality of our coast.  We’ve already saved 17 of the 40 most imperiled places on the NC Coast!

How does a land make the “Top 40”?

We established criteria that allowed potential projects to be ranked by factors including:

• Ecological Significance
  33 of the Top 40 places are classified as being “exceptional or very high” natural areas by the NC Natural Heritage Program. This designation applies to areas of land or water that are critical for conservation of the natural biodiversity of our state
• Biodiversity
  17 projects are ranked at or near the top of the Natural Heritage Program’s Wildlife Biodiversity and Habitat Assessment
• Landscape Position
  31 projects either connect tracts of protected land or are adjacent to other conservation lands
• Size
  17 projects will protect more than 1,000 acres each
• Public Use
  28 of the Top 40 could potentially become a park, preserve or natural area with public access
• Threatened
  16 are likely to be unavailable for conservation within the next 10 years