Mountain landscapes and ecosystems are highly susceptible to environmental change driven by both natural and anthropogenic processes. One of the most prominent interfaces between human activities and environmental change is land-use and associated impacts on land-cover. Transformations driven socially, economically and politically exceed natural changes both in amplitude and rates of change. Land-use studies and modelling have so far paid little attention to the special conditions of high mountain areas, often for instance concentrating on urban areas (e.g. Clarke et al., 1997).
The Swiss Alps experienced major changes in land-use in the last 50 years, with an increase in built-up areas of 14% between the early 1980s and the mid-1990s. Restrictions in available land for development result from the high relief and therefore conflicts and competition between stakeholders are common. In this paper we present two approaches to land-use modelling on a local scale and discuss the results from both approaches for the community of Davos, Switzerland.