The 2002 Landuse/Landcover by Watershed Management Area (WMA) data sets have been updated as of March 10, 2008. They are intended to replace previous versions available for download as of February 6, 2007. Errors identified by users during the first year of release have been corrected. These changes may have been made to either the 1995 or the 2002 land use data. While these changes will be minor in most instances, there may be some areas for which the changes may be more significant. In all cases the STATUS field value of 'FINAL' remains unchanged. For areas which have been corrected the APPROVED field value of '01/01/07' could now contain a value of '01/01/08'. This revision should take precedent over any other previously published versions.

The 2002 Land use/Land cover polygon shapefiles for New Jersey's Watershed Management Areas have been created by comparing the 1995 LU/LC layers from the NJDEP GIS database to the 2002 color infrared digital imagery, and delineating areas of change. For the 2002 update several new codes were added to the code list. All polygons retain the original 1995 land use code unless it was determined that the new code could be applied retroactively so that change analysis can be done correctly. In addition, an impervious surface (IS) code has been assigned to each polygon for 2002 as well as retaining the IS code from 1995.

As stated in this metadata record's Use Constraints section, NJDEP makes no representations of any kind, including, but not limited to, the warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular use, nor are any such warranties to be implied with respect to the digital data layers furnished hereunder. NJDEP assumes no responsibility to maintain them in any manner or form. By downloading this data, user agrees to the data use constraints listed within this metadata record.

Financial assistance was provided by the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, New Jersey Department of Transportation and by the Coastal Zone Management Act of 1972, as amended, administered by the Office of Ocean and Coastal Resource Management, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration through CZMA Grant Award # NA1702343.