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Planning in the Face of Uncertainty: Habitat Mapping that Supports Social-Ecological Networks and Resilient Estuaries
Citation:
Flitcroft, R. AND P. Clinton. Planning in the Face of Uncertainty: Habitat Mapping that Supports Social-Ecological Networks and Resilient Estuaries. CERF 2015, Portland, OR, November 08 - 11, 2015.
Impact/Purpose:
Planning for habitat restoration with the capacity to be effective in the face of climate uncertainty is critical to the sustainable production of seafood and maintenance of ecosystem function. There are several tools available for estimating the spatial extent of sea level rise in estuaries and along coasts such as the Digital Coast Sea-Level Rise viewer and the Sea Level Affecting Mars (SLAMM) tool. These tools tend to be general in scope and serve as screening tools not suitable for site analysis like the Digital Coast Sea-Level Rise viewer or, like SLAMM, they are not linked to local tidal a datum. The geographic information system (GIS) method we present links the most detailed digital elevation model (DEM) usually available with a local tidal datum for spatially explicit investigation of inundation potential at the site level.
Description:
Estuaries are located at the nexus of fresh and salt water, making them inherently dynamic. However, many land uses have reduced the natural capacity of estuaries and their floodplains to absorb changes in sea-level, precipitation regimes, and storminess. Land use planning that returns to estuaries the capacity to respond to change may help them, and the social-ecological networks that depend on them, to be resilient in an uncertain future. Unfortunately, future climate change, including sea-level rise and storm surges, could render many current restoration projects ineffective over time. Planning for habitat restoration with the capacity to be effective in the face of climate uncertainty is critical to the sustainable production of seafood and maintenance of ecosystem function. However, land managers and citizens lack the spatially explicit data needed to incorporate the potential effects of climate change into planning for habitat improvement projects in estuarine areas. We offer a simple method of linking LiDAR data to established tidal datums. Using this method, we were able to map potential changes in mean high tide, and equally importantly, potential areas of flooding due to storm surges. These types of map products are not data-intensive, and do not require long-term data collection. They do, however, offer a window into potential planning alternatives for restoration, land use, and land-development efforts. Along with locally specific information, these types of map products can identify places that may be potentially vulnerable to climate change, or places that may be effective migration corridors for marshes and other habitats.