Year: 2016
Project(s):
Relevance
Wind, water and wave action cause erosion and result in loss of residential and commercial property, reduction of storm-buffering capacity, aquatic and terrestrial habitat loss, increased suspended solids and water quality degradation along coastlines. To combat these effects, property owners often harden their shorelines with bulkheads or seawalls. While these methods are somewhat effective at reducing erosion, they also are associated with continual maintenance and a loss of intertidal habitat. Intertidal habitat is extremely important for producing the ecosystem functions and services necessary to maintain a healthy coastal ecosystem.
Response
The Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant Consortium’s living shorelines program seeks out and evaluates alternatives to hardened shorelines, such as living shorelines, for environmental and economic benefits. This program uses the gathered information to produce outreach and extension materials to educate a range of stakeholders from private property owners to government agencies. The program shares information about site suitability, cost and benefits of different erosion control techniques that lead to informed decision making and money savings. In 2016, the Living Shorelines Program organized two workshops for resource managers and landowners.
Results
Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant extension efforts informed decision-making on protection, restoration or enhancement of more than 3 linear miles of shoreline and saved two landowners more than $40,000 in sustainable erosion control.
Recap
Living shorelines education and extension efforts focused on educating resource managers and landowners on the site suitability, cost, and benefits of current erosion control techniques led to protection, restoration or enhancement of shorelines and money savings to landowners. (2016)