Human activity is increased by ease of access. Therefore, a
measure of access can be an important indicator of a variety of
stresses on ecosystems. Roads are the most common form of access
in Canada. Roads enable human access to extract resources, build
towns and industrial sites. Roads can also fragment the natural
landscape and bring undesirable effects on species that require
large tracts of undisturbed land. This map clearly shows the radical
difference between high road density in the settled parts of southern
Canada compared with virtually no roads in the Arctic ecosystems.
Refer to Table 1 to find the percentage of each road type (highway, primary,
secondary, street, and limited access roads) found in each ecozone.
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