We investigated how anthropogenic landscape industrialization affects croplands through increased emissions of fugitive dust along unpaved roads with energy-related traffic. We reviewed literature regarding plants and increased dust deposition and exposure and found that increased dust deposition and exposure negatively affected photosynthetic activity, chlorophyll content, and stomatal conductance. We measured: traffic, the amount and spatial extent of dust deposition, and plant physiological parameters in annual cereal crop fields adjacent to unpaved roads in western North Dakota. We found that increased traffic along an unpaved road influenced the amount and spatial extent of fugitive dust deposited in fields adjacent to an unpaved road. Increased dust deposition negatively affected plant photosynthetic activity. We measured bird activity using trail cameras and invertebrate abundance using sweep-netting in annual cereal crop fields adjacent to unpaved roads. Distance from an unpaved road or the measured deposition rates did not negatively affect bird activity and invertebrate abundance.