The Future of Nearshore Processes Research

Nicole Elko1, Falk Feddersen2, Diane L Foster3, Robert A Holman4, Jesse McNinch5, H Tuba Ozkan-Haller6, Nathaniel G Plant7, Britt Raubenheimer8, Steve Elgar8, Alex E Hay9, K Todd Holland10, James T Kirby Jr11, Thomas Charles Lippmann3, Jon K Miller12, Hilary F Stockdon13, Andrew D Ashton14, Alexandria B Boehm15, David Clark16, Edwin A Cowen17, Soupy Dalyander18, Guy R Gelfenbaum19, Cheryl J Hapke20, Jamie MacMahan21, Dylan McNamara22, Ryan P Mulligan23, Margaret L Palmsten24, Peter Ruggiero4, Christopher R Sherwood25 and Tian-Jian Hsu26, (1)ASBPA, Wadmalaw Island, SC, United States, (2)University of California San Diego, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, La Jolla, United States, (3)University of New Hampshire, Durham, United States, (4)Oregon State University, Corvallis, United States, (5)US Army Corps of Engineers, Coastal and Hydraulics Laboratory, United States, (6)Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR, United States, (7)U.S Geological Survey, Coastal and Marine Science Center, Saint Petersburg, FL, United States, (8)Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Applied Ocean Physics & Engineering, Woods Hole, United States, (9)Dalhousie University, Halifax, NS, Canada, (10)Naval Research Lab Stennis Space Center, Stennis Space Center, MS, United States, (11)University of Delaware, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Newark, DE, United States, (12)Stevens Institute of Technolog, Civil, Environmental, and Ocean Engineering, Hoboken, United States, (13)RCOAST, Saint Petersburg, United States, (14)Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Department of Geology and Geophysics, Woods Hole, United States, (15)Stanford University, Civil & Environmental Engineering, Stanford, United States, (16)WHOI, Woods Hole, MA, United States, (17)Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, United States, (18)Coastal and Marine Science Center St. Petersburg, St. Petersburg, FL, United States, (19)US Geological Survey, Saint Petersburg, FL, United States, (20)U.S. Geological Survey, St. Petersburg, United States, (21)Naval Postgraduate School, Oceanography, Monterey, United States, (22)University of North Carolina Wilmington, Wilmington, NC, United States, (23)Queen's University, Civil Engineering, Kingston, ON, Canada, (24)USGS Saint Petersburg Coastal and Marine Science Center, Saint Petersburg, United States, (25)U.S. Geological Survey, Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center, Woods Hole, United States, (26)University of Delaware, Civil, Construction, and Environmental Engineering, Newark, United States
Abstract:
Over 70 members of the nearshore coastal processes research community convened in April 2014 to discuss a vision for the future of nearshore science while celebrating the memories and contributions of our recently departed colleague, Abby Sallenger. The participants reviewed community accomplishments over the past four decades. Federal agencies, including FEMA, NOAA, NPS, USGS, USACE, and NRL discussed the most pressing societal needs within the coastal zone. The group engaged in a retrospective of the last four decades of progress, assessed the current status and limitations of nearshore processes research, and developed a vision for the future that focuses on societally relevant problems.

The top research topics identified included:

  1. Long-term Coastal Impacts: Meaningfully improve our understanding and prediction of the long-term coastal effects of sea level rise and changes in storminess patterns and associated efforts to protect coastal infrastructure.
  2. Extreme Events: Coastal flooding, overland flow, and concurrent morphological evolution during extreme events including the subsequent process of coastal recovery.
  3. Human and Ecosystem Health: Linkages between physical coastal processes (transport and mixing) and land-based pollution (pathogens, nutrients, toxic contaminants).

Critical for addressing these research questions is enabling infrastructure, such as new observational tools and data sets, models, and nearshore-community communication and collaboration. Idea and concepts developed during the meeting (to be published in Shore and Beach) will be presented to foster collaboration and advocacy amongst the wider nearshore community. Meeting materials are available at: https://scripps.ucsd.edu/centers/nearshorefuture/.

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