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Threatened Protection:
The Status of Coastal Protected Areas of the Eastern
United States
Margaret Walls Resources for the Future
America’s Conservation Investment
• Federal government
• 640 million acres of land
• 397 NPS sites, 560 National Wildlife Refuges, 700 million
acres of BLM lands, 155 National Forests, and more
• 30+ land conservation programs spend >$6
billion/year on land acquisitions and easements (Walls et al. 2009)
• State government
• 80 state land conservation programs in 43 states
spend ~$4 billion/year on land and easements (Walls
et al. 2009)
• Land trusts
• The 4 largest have protected over 38 million acres
of land November 2014
R.O.I.
• The return on these investments is sizeable…
• Ecosystem services
• water purification, temperature regulation, carbon storage, flood
mitigation, storm surge attenuation, wildlife habitat
• Recreational benefits
• In coastal settings, the return is especially high
• Beaches attenuate waves; wetlands reduce duration of surge,
filter water entering estuaries, provide critical habitat, and more
• Recreational benefits:
• Lots of studies (see library at Center for the Blue Economy). Total
nonmarket value of ocean recreation >$100 billion/year
• 85% of tourism revenues in U.S. are generated in coastal states
• The 10 National Seashores account for 18 million visitors/year
November 2014
Climate Change
These investments are at risk
• In coastal areas, storms and hurricanes are expected
to worsen in intensity (IPCC 5th Assessment)
• Sea level rise (SLR) projections vary by location
but are between 1 and 6 feet by end of century
for much of the East coast (Nicholls and Cazenave
2011; Slangen et al. 2014; Boesch et al. 2013)
• SLR not just about eventual inundation but also
• Erosion
• Increased coastal flooding
• Damage to wetlands & wetland migration
• Increased salinity in estuaries & saltwater intrusion in
freshwater ponds & aquifers
November 2014
Study Objectives
• Develop an inventory of coastal
protected lands in shoreline counties
of the 15 East coast states…
• Location, ownership, land cover
• Assess threat from SLR
• Evaluate and compare states’
abilities to adapt
• Financial resources to replace
inundated lands?
• Adaptation strategies/plans?
November 2014
Joint work with Becky Epanchin-
Niell, Carolyn Kousky, Supriya
Khadke
Shoreline Counties
Shoreline counties are adjacent to the open ocean or major estuaries; residents are considered “the population most directly affected by the coast” (NOAA 2013)
November 2014
Protected Lands in Shoreline Counties
About 14.5 million acres
of protected lands in
shoreline counties in
these 15 Eastern states
November 2014
Source: USGS Gap Analysis
Program, Protected Areas
Database of the United States
(PAD-US). Note: DOD lands with
Status Code 4 removed from
analysis.)
Protected Lands in Shoreline Counties, by Owner
November 2014
About 40% is state-
owned; 55% state+local
Federal
FWS NPS FS Other
34.7% 30.0% 26.7% 8.6%
24% is federal
Protected Lands by Owner, by State
Land Cover of Protected Lands
New England, Total New England, Protected
Mid-Atlantic, Total Mid-Atlantic, Protected
Southeast, Total Southeast, Protected
Developed
Cultivated/Pasture
Grassland/Herbaceous
Forests
Scrub/Shrub
Palustrine Forested Wetlands
Palustrine Nonforested Wetlands
Estuarine Wetlands
Unconsolidated Shore
Bare Land
Open Water
Landcover in shoreline counties by protection status and region
New England, Total New England, Protected
Mid-Atlantic, Total Mid-Atlantic, Protected
Southeast, Total Southeast, Protected
Developed
Cultivated/Pasture
Grassland/Herbaceous
Forests
Scrub/Shrub
Palustrine Forested Wetlands
Palustrine Nonforested Wetlands
Estuarine Wetlands
Unconsolidated Shore
Bare Land
Open Water
Landcover in shoreline counties by protection status and region
New England, Total New England, Protected
Mid-Atlantic, Total Mid-Atlantic, Protected
Southeast, Total Southeast, Protected
Developed
Cultivated/Pasture
Grassland/Herbaceous
Forests
Scrub/Shrub
Palustrine Forested Wetlands
Palustrine Nonforested Wetlands
Estuarine Wetlands
Unconsolidated Shore
Bare Land
Open Water
Landcover in shoreline counties by protection status and region
New England, Total New England, Protected
Mid-Atlantic, Total Mid-Atlantic, Protected
Southeast, Total Southeast, Protected
Developed
Cultivated/Pasture
Grassland/Herbaceous
Forests
Scrub/Shrub
Palustrine Forested Wetlands
Palustrine Nonforested Wetlands
Estuarine Wetlands
Unconsolidated Shore
Bare Land
Open Water
Landcover in shoreline counties by protection status and region
As we move north
to south…land
cover changes from
forest to wetlands.
Mostly forests Forests, farms, wetlands Mostly wetlands
November 2014 Source: 2011 NOAA, Coastal Change Analysis Program (C-CAP)
Sea Level Rise
Methodology:
• NOAA’s Sea Level Rise and Coastal Flooding
Impacts Viewer
• Uses high-resolution LIDAR data to identify
inundated lands at different increments of SLR
• Accounts for SLR on top of local tidal data through
elevation transformations using NOAA’s VDatum tool
• Limitations:
• “Bath-tub model”…doesn’t account for localized
subsidence, accretion, migration, or for local waterways
• We obtained the data and analyzed a 3 ft SLR
scenario (in all locations)
November 2014
Percentage of Protected Lands within & outside 3 ft SLR zone
November 2014
Varies across states…
• 3% in NY, NH, RI
• ~40% in VA, FL
• ~50% in NC, GA
• 56% in SC
Land Cover and Sea Level Rise
November 2014
Adaptation: Do States Have the Resources?
Can states replace these lost investments?
• States have a variety of land conservation programs
funded by real estate transfer fees, document
recording fees, license plate charges, lottery
revenues, bonds, sales tax surcharges, and more
• Some programs use money for fee acquisitions and
some for easements
• Type of lands targeted varies by state and by
program
• Some examples:
• Florida Forever
• Maryland’s Program Open Space and Rural Legacy
• New Jersey’s Green Acres
State Conservation Spending vs Inundated Acreage of State Protected Lands
November 2014 Source: Trust for Public Land’s Conservation Almanac
Florida (not on graph):
$246 million/ 1.9 mill
inundated acres
Adaptation: Are States Planning?
No plan
North Carolina
South Carolina
Georgia
• 9 of the 15 states have adaptation plans (Georgetown
Climate Center 2014)
• 7 have set specific goals for oceans and coasts
• Most have exhibited very little or no progress toward stated
goals
• States facing the biggest loss of land to SLR have no
plans
• Even among states with plans, protected lands are
not a point of emphasis November 2014
Planning underway
Delaware
New Jersey
Rhode Island
Maryland
Seems to be doing the most…
• Blue Infrastructure Near-Shore Assessments: detailed
spatial evaluation of coastal habitat and natural
resources “to incorporate estuarine priorities into
targeting and land use planning”
• “Coastal Atlas”, estuaries mapping tool
• With SLR, new wetland areas identified
• Greenprint tool, developed for use in conservation
targeting, revised to remove lands that are likely to be
subject to SLR by 2050 “to avoid spending limited
funding in areas likely to be submerged.”
November 2014
