Historic landscape character and climate change adaptation: modelling impacts and opportunities

This project will investigate the potential of historic landscapes to respond to impacts of climate change. It will consider how

cutting-edge methods could help us use relevant historic landscape characteristics in order to address risks associated with increasingly intense rainfall. It will focus specifically on soil erosion and flood risk. The research aims to:

- Discover how the potential of key historic character types (in relation to climate change) can be assessed and quantified over the long term through specific case-studies; - Develop methods for assessing these benefits over large areas using existing HE datasets; - Investigate how these insights could be translated into landscape management policy.

The research will implement cutting-edge methods in geoarchaeology, spatial analysis and computer modelling for the first

time in England to examine the long-term interaction of landscape character with flood risk and soil erosion, and how the growing risks due to climate change could be mitigated by strengthening historic character. The project will build on perspectives developed through recent work by Newcastle University which has been sponsored by Historic England, the

Environment Agency and the National Trust. The project is original because it will develop a new methodology and create new knowledge about the long-term

environmental value of key historic character types in the UK. It is important because this knowledge has the potential to

underpin new strategies which activate historic character in climate change adaptation. Key benefits of collaboration with

Historic England will be access to relevant data as well as the potential to develop direct routes between research, policy and practical implementation.