Public reading

Shaded-relief view of the land around Puerto Jiménez, Puntarenas Province, 61301, the parcel boundary drawn in gold29 ha inside the gold line
500 m
Shaded relief · AWS Terrain Tiles

Puerto Jiménez, Puntarenas Province, 61301

29 ha · 8.394, -83.289 · Costa Rica

55out of 100 · Land ScoreRestore

Worth restoring — and worth the patience.

36th percentile for like land · Frontier tier · 55 conservation priority

Water
71
Soil
57
Ecology
68
Climate
10
Pressure
71

19 of 30 sources answered · higher is better on every pillar; pressure reads calm · silent: sentinel2_ndvi, sentinel1_rtc, osm_reach…

The reading in full

This 29-hectare parcel near Puerto Jiménez, Puntarenas Province, 61301 is land with sound foundations and clear regenerative upside. It scores 55 out of 100 on the Dear Wise Earth Land Score.

The risks that most shape a decision here: The rainfall archive shows an unusually steep drying signal — verify before relying on it. A swing this large more often reflects a data artifact or measurement change than real climate; water planning should wait on local records rather than build on this number. This area is highly exposed to projected climate change by 2050. Large shifts in temperature and rainfall can change what the land can support, so any plan should be built around the projected conditions, not current ones. This ground has a recorded seismic history. Repeated strong earthquakes within reach shape how anything here should be built — seismic design codes, slope stability under shaking, and insurance all follow from it.

Where the upside lies: Most of the parcel reads as tree cover. Tree cover can carry real conservation and carbon value, but satellite land-cover cannot tell natural forest from a monoculture plantation (oil palm, rubber, teak). Confirm which it is before assuming biodiversity or carbon value. A watercourse lies close to the parcel. Nearby surface water improves access to irrigation and supply and adds habitat value, though rights and distance still affect how usable it is.

The wider readings: Rainfall is very high. Abundant water supports productive growth but raises the risk of flooding, waterlogging, and nutrient leaching, so drainage and slope matter. The land is gently rolling. Gentle terrain is generally workable with only minor grading for buildings or roads. The flat ground is real but scattered — it does not add up to one site. A parcel can be a quarter buildable and still have nowhere to put a building. Small benches spread across a slope suit dispersed, light structures far better than anything that wants a single footprint. Biodiversity records are moderate. There is a reasonable but incomplete picture of local wildlife; a ground survey would sharpen any conservation or regulatory assessment. Soil organic carbon is moderate. The soil is workable but will benefit from cover cropping and organic inputs to build fertility before intensive use. Road and town access are close. Good access lowers development and logistics costs but can raise encroachment pressure and land prices. The human fabric around this land is measured, not assumed. Labour, emergencies, schooling, and electricity all run on these distances — they decide what daily life and operations here actually cost. Jurisdiction is part of the parcel. Permits, zoning, water, and roads run through these offices — knowing who governs the land is the first step of every plan that touches it.

What the land is telling us: The land reads as holding rather than actively regenerating: the standing cover is intact, but the water or vegetation signal is under strain, so the trajectory turns on how the coming dry years are managed. Of the land's core processes, the water cycle reads as adequate to abundant, so the question is less supply than how well the land captures and holds what falls. What orbit cannot see is what happens below the surface — soil biology, structure, and the carbon held in the ground — so treat those as the first things to confirm underfoot. Taken together, this is land with sound foundations and clear regenerative upside. Its clearest strength to build from is that most of the parcel reads as tree cover.

The ground and its cover

Terrain · shaded relief — Puerto Jiménez, Puntarenas Province, 61301
500 m
Terrain · shaded relief · AWS Terrain Tiles
Land cover · ESA WorldCover 2021 — Puerto Jiménez, Puntarenas Province, 61301
500 m
Land cover · ESA WorldCover 2021 · ESA / Copernicus

The verdict, the five pillar readings, how much of the land was read, and the headline figures.

The verdict

55out of 100 · Land ScoreRestore

Worth restoring — and worth the patience.

Puerto Jiménez, Puntarenas Province, 61301

36th percentile for like land · Frontier tier · 55 conservation priority

Five readings

Water71strong
Soil57fair
Ecology68strong
Climate10watch
Pressure71strong

Weakest: Climate

All five read on one axis: higher is better. Pressure scores calm, so a high number means little human pressure on this land.

Standing

36thpercentile

Tropical · Neotropic · against 46 readings · 34th of all 100

Coverage

19 of 30 layers answered

Every pillar read from live data.

Silent: Sentinel-2, the radar, the infrastructure reach +8.

Where the capital goes

55/ 100 priority

Frontierhospitality fit 65

Best-fit model

Corridor anchor reserve

50 / 100

Fit from published rules over the indicators.

The land in numbers

Area
29ha
Elevation
189m
117–238 m
Slope
7.2°
Buildable bench
2.86ha
43% of the land under 10° slope
Forest cover
100%
Canopy height
not read
Rainfall
4,506mm/yr
-40% over 20 yr
Warming to 2050
+1.3°C
rain +47%
Soil carbon
29.9g/kg
pH 5.4
Nearest road
0.3km
Species records
396records
GBIF, the global species archive

Headline figures. The Why tab carries each reading in full, with its source and its date. “Not read” means the source had nothing for this parcel: a gap is named, never filled with a guess.

How this land works

About 4,506 mm of rain falls here in a year. 100% of the parcel is under tree cover, and the ground slopes 7.2° on average, enough to move water without tearing soil where roots hold it. 7 mapped watercourses cross the land (Río Piro, Río Sombrerillo). A road runs against the boundary, which is the pressure the edge lives with. By 2050 the models expect +1.3 °C and +47% rain, so every flow above runs a little differently than it does today.

Holdingthe canopy has held while the rain record fell -39.5%.

Protect the keystone; hold the connection open. With 100% tree cover beside the network and a conservation priority of 55, the leverage here is protection: secure the core so the connection it anchors stays open. To help: keep the canopy whole; the loop is running the right way on its own.

The score is the footnote. What matters is the pattern above it: what arrives, what the ground does with it, what leaves, and which way that is moving.

This place

29 hectares at Puerto Jiménez of rolling land around 189 m. The ground reads 100% under canopy. Water shapes it — 4,506 mm of rain a year, 7 traced watercourses. Sparsely peopled — 302 neighbours within 5 km, governed from Puerto Jiménez.

Its vocationprotect

Protect the keystone; hold the connection open. With 100% tree cover beside the network and a conservation priority of 55, the leverage here is protection: secure the core so the connection it anchors stays open.

189 m elevation100% forest7.2° slope4,506 mm rain/yrFrontier tier — outside the mapped network
Its trajectoryholding, but dryingthe canopy has held while the rain record fell -39.5%.

This is an outsider's reading, assembled from instruments and public records. It is where understanding begins, not where it ends — the land, its neighbours, and the people who know it hold the rest.

Sources & method · 19 layers
Water, roads & protected areas — OpenStreetMap

Overpass (waterways, highways, places, protected areas)

vector · live
ODbL 1.0
Biodiversity — GBIF

Occurrence records (count + top species)

point · live
Mixed CC0 / CC-BY / CC-BY-NC (per dataset)
Heritage presence — public record

Recorded historic/heritage features within 10 km — generalized to counts, classes and distance bands; never coordinates

landscape (10 km) · live
ODbL 1.0
Place memory — Wikipedia

Named places and features of the surrounding landscape (titles + distances)

article · live
CC BY-SA 4.0 (titles/facts)
Ecological corridors — PNCB / SINAC (Costa Rica)

Declared biological corridors (bundled screening reference of official corridors; approximate extents — confirm against SINAC/PNCB)

screening extent · PNCB (rolling)
Public programme (SINAC); reference compiled for screening
Regional illness — dengue burden (Costa Rica)

Dengue notifications by cantón 2013–2018 (suspected + probable + confirmed) + national series to 2024; bundled OpenDengue V1.3 extract — historical burden geography, not the current season

cantón · 2013–2018 (cantón) / 2024 (national)
CC-BY 4.0 (OpenDengue)
Place — OpenStreetMap / Nominatim

Nominatim reverse geocode

settlement · live
ODbL 1.0
Terrain — AWS Terrarium (Mapzen)

Terrarium elevation tiles

~10 m (z12) · 2017
Open (attribution)
Climate — Open-Meteo

Archive 2004–2024 + MPI-ESM1-2-XR to 2050

~9 km · 2004–2024 / 2045–2049
CC-BY 4.0 (data); non-commercial API tier
Soil — ISRIC SoilGrids v2

SoilGrids v2.0 (SOC, pH, sand, clay; 0–30 cm)

250 m · 2020
CC-BY 4.0
Land cover — ESA WorldCover

WorldCover 2021 v200

10 m · 2021
CC-BY 4.0 (commercial promotion: notify due@esa.int)
Surface water — JRC Global Surface Water

Global Surface Water v1.4 — occurrence & seasonality

30 m · 1984–2021
Copernicus / open (attribution)
Forest loss — Hansen Global Forest Change

Global Forest Change (tree cover 2000 + annual loss)

~30 m · 2000–2023
CC-BY 4.0
Siting — TERRA geometry on the AWS Terrarium DEM

Per-cell slope and aspect (Horn), buildable share, largest contiguous bench

~10–80 m cells, parcel-dependent (stated per reading) · 2017 (DEM)
Open (attribution)
Watershed — Global Watersheds (MERIT-Hydro)

Upstream basin + downstream flowpath (screening hydrography)

~90 m · MERIT-Hydro 2019
Open service, no warranty; engine open source (delineator)
Population — WorldPop

Gridded population 2020 (parcel + 5 km ring sums)

~100 m · 2020
CC-BY 4.0
Seismicity — USGS earthquake catalog

M ≥ 5 events within 100 km, past 50 years

event · live catalog
US public domain (cite USGS)
Governance — public map record + Wikidata

Administrative hierarchy + structured facts of the governing unit

admin unit · live / Atlas data year 2022
ODbL 1.0 / CC0 / PNUD-UCR publication (attribution)
Indigenous territories — official record (Costa Rica)

Official decree-delimited territory boundaries (legal-constraint overlay; never scored or ranked)

official boundary · decree delimitations (rolling)
SNIT/FONAFIFO public services (attribution); decree facts public law

Every number above is public, open data — named, dated, and licensed. What TERRA does not publish is the lens: the weights, curves, and verdict thresholds that turn these layers into a Land Score. That judgment is calibrated from land walked on the ground, and it stays proprietary.

Unavailable for this parcel: Sentinel-2, the radar, the infrastructure reach, osm adaptation, the national registry, the governance record, the thermal read, the biomass map, the underground atlas, the hazard screen, modis fire history — the affected pillars were reweighted, not guessed.

Generated Thu, 10 Sep 2026 19:50:25 GMT · 19.1s · synthesized by TERRA.

This land, over time

Read 2 times since Sep 10, 2026. The score has fallen 3 points between the first reading and the latest. Each reading asked every source afresh, so a change is in the record, not in the lens.

  1. Sep 10, 202655Restorefirst readingThis reading
  2. Sep 14, 202652Cultivate-3Open →

A newer reading exists. Open the latest, Sep 14, 2026