Spatial optimization is a methodology used to maximize or minimize a management objective given the limited area finite resources and spatial relationships in an ecosystem optimization approaches can be used to evaluate a great variety of options and allow tradeoff analyses that might be impossible with other methods. Click on the article title to read more. Archived publications applied turfgrass science 2004 2014 crop management 2002 2014 forage grazinglands 2003 2014 journal of production agriculture 1988 1999. Spatial optimization for and timber in managed forest ecosystems wildlife john g hof lnqd a joyce this paper presents several nonlinear formulations for land allocation that optimize spatial layout for a single time period and that have the property that the number of choice variables increases linearly with the