Tara Wu

Member

After thru-hiking the Appalachian Trail, Tara Wu dedicated her career to environmental conservation and sustainability. Based in Asheville, she supports the US Forest Service (USFS) and the City of Asheville with GIS, infrastructure assessment, and mapping, particularly following natural disasters like Tropical Storm Fred and Hurricane Helene. Tara has created interactive maps summarizing damage status along the Appalachian Trail and used GIS to assess terrain, maintenance needs, and reroutes. She helped secure $100,000 in grant funding for deferred maintenance, supported Visitor Use Management committees for Max Patch and Roan Highlands, and developed volunteer and partnership programs with record turnout.

Tara is completing her second graduate degree in Spatial Data Science and is researching invasive species proliferation due to climate change through AI-driven species distribution modeling. Her interests lie at the intersection of GIS, climate, infrastructure, recreation ecology, and community science. In her free time, Tara maintains sections of the Appalachian Trail and fosters animals with her husband. She also hopes to return to marathon running after completing her degree.