Citation:

Mulvaney, K., J. Twichell, N. Merrill, AND J. Bousquin. Landscape-scale inequities for coastal access in Rhode Island. Watershed Action Alliance 2021 Virtual Conference on Environmental Justice, NA, Virtual, March 24, 2021.

Impact/Purpose:

Access to coastal waters is important for mental and physical well-being. We investigated the relative ability of different people to be able to access coastal waters in Rhode Island based upon their race, ethnicity, and income. We found that both Latinx and Black populations have to travel farther to get to coastal access areas than average and that White populations have to travel less far to access points.

Description:

Development, gentrification, and water quality degradation have altered access to the coasts, redistributing the benefits from those spaces. Building on prior coastal and green space access research, we examined different populations’ relative travel distances to all public coastal access and to public marine swimming beaches throughout the state of Rhode Island, by race, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status. Next, we assessed relative travel distances to high quality public coastal amenities, i.e., sites with no history of water quality impairment. We used three state-level policy attributes to identify sites with the best water quality: 303(d) impaired waters, shellfishing restrictions, and bacterial beach closure histories. Our analysis revealed statewide disparities in access to Rhode Island’s public coastal amenities. With controls for other possible explanations, there remained disproportionately shorter travel distances for White populations, and disproportionately longer travel distances for Black and Latinx populations, in particular to public coastal sites with better water quality and to public swimming beaches. This translated to a cost savings per coastal recreation trip for White populations and, conversely, an added cost of several dollars (USD) on each trip for Black and Latinx populations.

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