THE CHUGACH CENSUS AREA LAND BRIEF
Land in the
Pacific Coastal Mountains setting.
Chugach Census Area has 9,574.3 square miles of land in Alaska. 2 mapped landscape regions meet across Chugach Census Area: Pacific Coastal Mountains, Coastal Western Hemlock-Sitka Spruce Forests.
Coastal Alaska's steep, wet mountains include large areas of glacial terrain. Rocky slopes and ice-covered highlands contrast with lower shrub-covered settings where vegetation can establish.
Regional context: Pacific Coastal Mountains ↗ · Regional mapping across the county footprint
Where the landscape changes
Chugach Census Area intersects 2 mapped regional units. The largest mapped shares are:
- Pacific Coastal Mountains66.8%
- Coastal Western Hemlock-Sitka Spruce Forests33.2%
Coastal Western Hemlock-Sitka Spruce Forests in Chugach Census Area
Deep bays, steep valley walls and an irregular shoreline reveal intense past glaciation. Wet maritime forests of hemlock and Sitka spruce characterize southeastern and south-central coastal Alaska.
Read the regional source ↗Finding your parcel within Chugach Census Area
The atlas lists 5 cities, towns, townships, and Census communities associated with Chugach Census Area, including Valdez, Cordova, Chenega. The list includes overlapping geography types and does not divide the county into exclusive service areas.
Chugach Census Area by land and water
The Census records 5,613.5 square miles of water within Chugach Census Area, or 37% of its total area. That share is close to Chugach Census Area’s 37%. This is geographic context; waterfront status and usable land must be checked at the parcel.
For scale, Chugach Census Area has 156.1 times the land area of nearby Cordova city (61.4 square miles). These areas describe boundaries, not comparable property prices.
The Census boundary meets Anchorage Municipality, Copper River Census Area, Kenai Peninsula Borough, Matanuska-Susitna Borough, Yakutat City and Borough within Alaska. A tract near one of these lines should be matched to the county identifier on its own records.