Local land-use planning to conserve biodiversity: planners' perspectives on what works.

Because habitat loss due to urbanization is a primary threat to biodiversity, and land-use decisions in urbanizing areas are mainly made at the local level, land-use planning by municipal planning departments has a potentially important--but largely unrealized--role in conserving biodiversity. To understand planners' perspectives on the factors that facilitate and impede biodiversity conservation in local planning, we interviewed directors of 17 municipal planning departments in the greater Seattle (Washington, U.S.