Rugged terrain measures for social science research: Using the Area and Road Ruggedness Scales for county-level analysis

Abstract Rugged terrain is a landscape characteristic that has complex and often contradictory impacts on the size, geographic distribution, and economic vitality of locations. The USDA ERS’s Area and Road Ruggedness Scales provide two different types of information on the relative topographic variation of 2010 census tracts. These data characterize both the overall landscape and land where people travel. However, researchers frequently conduct analyses at larger geographic scales, such as counties. In this paper, we describe how the Area and Road Ruggedness Scales data were created and suggest several methods of aggregating the data to the county level. We use correlations and regressions of natural amenities on net migration to compare the suitability of our suggested county-level area ruggedness measures to the topography measure from the Natural Amenities Scale. We find that, despite data loss due to aggregation, county-level area ruggedness measures can serve as reasonable proxies for topographical amenities. However, they do not capture certain landscape features that positively influence migration.