Preventing small-scale physical disturbance from causing large-scale turbidity and loss of coastal habitats

Small-scale coastal exploitation and recreational boating is increasing rapidly despite management efforts, resulting in severe negative impact on coastal ecosystems through increased sediment resuspension and turbidity causing collapse of shallow ecosystems and loss of coastal vegetation.

A sustainable management is presently impeded by a lack of understanding of the relationship between small-scale physical disturbance and large-scale biological impact, and how a functional legislation and management should be developed to prevent cumulative impacts on degrading coastal habitats.With an interdisciplinary research team, in collaboration with stakeholders, we will use: (1) remote sensing analysis from satellite images and field studies to assess quantitative relationships between small-scale construction, dredging and recreational boat traffic, human induced turbidity, and biological impacts on plants and animals, (2) monitoring data and hydrodynamic modeling to assess if dumping of dredge material from recreational marinas constitute a major source for a recent spread of TBT and other contaminants to the environment, (3) legal analyses to identify dysfunctional legislation and management practices for the coastal environment, and suggest how the governance could be improved by using the new information provided in the project.

Together with stakeholders this information will be used to develop management guidelines for more a more sustainable recreational use of the coasts.