Synthethical Review of Ecological Connectivity for Biological Conservation in Urban Landscapes

The habitats of many ground-based fauna species in developing urban regions have altered in their structure and are often isolated from other habitat locations due to the urban growth. Habitat areas that are well connected to other fragments of habitat have been shown to assist particular fauna in their movement from one location to another. Habitat connectivity is therefore seen as critical to the survival of many fauna species in urban locations.Two key benefits of faunal movement are the transfer of genes resulting in improved genetic diversity and support for larger populations of particular species. Ecological connectivity has been applied frequently in different disciplines and this has resulted in overwhelming number of methods and measures applied. Therefore choice of suitable methods and measures still remains problematic. This research aims to establish a suitable method to evaluate connectivity to support biodiversity in urban regions. In this paper connectivity is defined and the factors required for accurately studying connectivity in the urban environment are then discussed. The methods and measures for connectivity are reviewed and classified. Finally, the relevance of each of the reviewed methods, and their specific criteria, are analysed and the method that meets the established criteria for this study is selected. This paper concludes that the joint application of graph theory and least-cost modelling incorporates the movement charachteristics and abilities of species in connectivity analysis and meets most of the established criteria to assess connectivity. The suggested method will serve as a foundation to support conservation planning and decision-making through the establishment of priority areas within the urban landscape.