Onondaga County Ag Mapper

Another way to look at our agricultural lands is through NYS Agricultural District enrollment.  

New York’s  Agricultural Districts Law   was enacted in 1971 to protect and promote the availability of land for farming purposes.

Agricultural districts protect agriculture through a combination of landowner incentives and protections that discourage the conversion of farmland to non-agricultural uses.  Agricultural districts are generally defined as areas that rely on farming as the primary economic activity, and enrollment in a District primarily benefit owners of land that is farmed.

Onondaga County currently has approximately 11,000 parcels - nearly 200,000 acres of land - enrolled in the NYS Agricultural Districts Program.  

For more information on the Agricultural Districts program in Onondaga County,  click here .

Here is a view of Onondaga County Agricultural Districts 1 through 4.   

Farmers and agencies have long been engaged in a number of farmland protection activities, but perhaps one of the most impactful partnerships in recent years has been the Farmland Conservation Easements Program.

Also known as the "Purchase (or Donation) of Development Rights" (PDR) program, farmland conservation easements are voluntary legal agreements that restrict the development of farmland in return for monetary compensation.  The goal is to preserve land suited for farming that is also vulnerable to development pressure.  In return for preserving the land base, farmers are able to capture equity from their land to reinvest into their farm operations. 

To date, close to 12,000 acres have been, or are in the process of, being permanently protected as “forever farmland” in the county through local, state and federal easement programs. This represents an over $27 million investment in the preservation of local agriculture. 

Onondaga County works with landowners, the New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets, Onondaga County Agriculture Council, local land trusts and other partners to facilitate these projects.  Here is map of agricultural conservation easement projects, or permanently protected farmland, in Onondaga County.   

For more information about farmland conservation easements and to contact us if you are interested in potentially protecting your land, please visit  Syracuse-Onondaga County Planning Agency - Agricultural Easements . 

Farmland is at the core of the agricultural community, yet is also one of the most threatened components of the farming industry.  As such, identification of the County’s most important farmland was seen as a primary task for the updated Agriculture & Farmland Protection Plan.

To identify our most important farmland, the following maps were created to illustrate agricultural community characteristics across the County. Using these maps, the planning team created a model to rank these characteristics by parcel, and highlight parcels with high value to the agricultural community.

It is envisioned that these mapping resources will help the County's Agriculture and Farmland Protection Board (AFPB), municipalities and the public in a variety of ways, including:

• Scoring of projects being considered for conservation easements or other grant programs. (See Farmland Protection section.)
• Integration into County and municipal comprehensive plans and/or land use plans, to aid in identifying areas prescribed for future development and supportive infrastructure, or alternately, lands to be protected from encroachment of urban development.
• Readily available data layers to help us understand the local ag community and land dynamics affecting a particular area.  Data in this analysis are often considered by local governments to assess impacts to land and resources and compatibility with neighboring uses.

The Analysis of Important Farmland starts with mapping of data layers in four Focus Areas:

Soil Value

Agricultural Vibrancy

Natural Resources

Land Development

For each focus area, individual datasets were weighted and aggregated into Focus Area Maps showing relative values for all agricultural lands in that category. Each of those values were then combined to result in an overall scoring of important farmland throughout Onondaga County, and presented in the Priority Agricultural Lands map.

Keep scrolling to explore each of the focus areas, and the Priority Agricultural Lands mapping. At the end, you will also find an Interactive Map, where you can explore all of the data layers in more detail.

For more information on source data and scoring methodology,  click here  (Appendix C).

Soils are among the most basic and important assets of farmed land.  While good soils are prevalent in Onondaga County, this is not the case nationally, and as such should be considered as an important and limited resource.  

Prime Soils generally consist of USDA identified soil types which have the best combination of physical and chemical characteristics for producing food, feed and other crops which are of value to the agricultural sector.  Farmland of Statewide Importance reflects lands which do not specifically meet USDA criteria, but have been identified as important by the New York State.

The Soils Focus Area Map here reflects a weighted ranking of these three combined data layers on individual agricultural parcels. 

Agricultural lands shown in the darkest color are those with the highest relative agricultural soil value “score.” While Onondaga County is fortunate to have excellent soils throughout the County, higher value soils are found generally in the Finger Lakes watershed areas as well as in the northwest portion of the county, known in particular for its soils suited for growing fruits and vegetables. 

Clustering of agricultural lands can have numerous benefits.  Density or proximity of farms to one another helps to support ag-related businesses and suppliers.  Crossing or traveling on rural, agricultural roadways is less dangerous and burdensome.  Access to compatible and affordable lands is increased. And it reduces neighbor conflicts and inefficiencies from being located adjacent to urban development.

The following maps shows the location of actively cultivated lands, parcels receiving agricultural assessments (agriculture related tax exemptions) and lands protected in perpetuity as agricultural conservation easements. 

The Agricultural Vibrancy Focus Area Map to the right reflects a weighted ranking of the above combined data layers, as well as parcel size (not shown above) on individual agricultural parcels. 

Agricultural lands shown in the darkest green areas are those with the highest agricultural vibrancy “score”, or highest agricultural density. Multiple areas of vibrant agricultural activity appear here, with strong visible clusters in different locations in Onondaga County.

Agricultural lands host - and often protect - key resources that are critically important to the environment.  When farmland is transitioned to developed land, environmental values of the land can be easily compromised. 

As such, the presence of certain natural features or open spaces are a valued component of agricultural land holdings. The relationship is often complementary to both agriculture and the environment.

Six criteria were used to evaluate the extent to which agricultural use parcels would serve to protect or buffer valuable natural resources and assets: lands within a drinking water supply watershed; proximity to wetlands; presence of floodplains; proximity to a protected stream or waterbody or other major lakes or ponds; proximity to a public park, environmental-based land trust owned, or other protected property; and within a scenic viewshed.

The Natural Resources Focus Area Map at right reflects a weighted ranking of these combined data layers on lands identified as farmland.  Agricultural lands shown in the darkest colored areas are those with the highest natural resource “score”. Noteable natural area corridors and clusters are easily highlighted with this mapping.

While Onondaga County has a vibrant and prominent agricultural presence, it also contains a major central city, significant and emerging suburban corridors and neighborhoods, commercial centers, and rural hamlets, villages and scattered homesites.  

Land development in a county such as Onondaga threatens agricultural land availability as well as affordability.  The encroachment of residential development in proximity to agricultural operations can also cause conflicts between incompatible land uses. 

The following datasets are leading indicators of where residential and commercial development, as well as the emerging commercial solar development industry, are likely looking to develop in coming years. 

As shown with the in the Land Development Focus Area Map, there is a significant perimeter around the Syracuse Urbanized Area that indicates the highest conversion values.

In the last 50 years, Onondaga County has lost approximately half of its agricultural lands to development.

It is increasingly important to preserve remaining agricultural lands threatened by development pressure. 

The following map shows a combined, aggregated map of the four focus area mapping analyses (Soil Types, Ag Proximity, Natural Resources and Land Development) to show an overall picture of important agricultural lands in Onondaga County.   

As shown in this map, there are clusters or areas of the agricultural community that stand out as highly important agricultural lands.  Some are greatly based on inherent land qualities while others stand out based on high ranking for natural resource qualities, and others may highlight vulnerabilities to development pressure.  Those with the highest rankings likely rank highly in multiple areas.  

Per the  Onondaga County Agriculture & Farmland Protection Plan , these areas should be prioritized by Onondaga County agencies, municipalities, and support organizations for policies, projects and practices to protect and enhance Onondaga County agriculture.

Prioritizing these areas will optimally result in improved protection of our most precious agricultural assets.

Please take a moment to explore this Interactive Ag Mapper tool to dig a little deeper.

In this map, you can enter an address, pan around with your mouse, or zoom in to a municipality, neighborhood or individual parcel to view the agriculture and farmland protection data presented in the above storymap.

In the top right corner, click on the Legend button to see the list of current data layers. To add or remove layers from view, click on the Layer List button (some layers require you to zoom in). Click on the Basemap Gallery icon (4 boxes, below the address field) to change your background type.