EBC Ocean & Coastal Resources Program: Coastal Resiliency and Marine Spatial Planning

View the Attendee List

Around the world, coastal towns and cities are seeking ways to adapt to the imminent threats associated with climate change, particularly sea level rise and increasing storm activity. These forces will cause flooding and inundation of shoreline areas, posing a threat to human safety, infrastructure such as buildings and roads, natural habitats, species, and ecosystems. In the United States, governments – primarily municipalities – have much of the responsibility for adapting to climate change using local scale land-use zoning and other planning, management, and regulatory mechanisms. Coastal resilience is an ecosystem-based coastal and marine spatial planning framework that utilizes sea level rise, storm surge, ecological, and socioeconomic spatial information to identify and implement ecosystem-based adaptation strategies. Attendees will acquire a deeper understanding of vulnerability from coastal hazards, as well as emerging methodologies and practices focused on reducing risk and determining the value of nature-based solutions through practical approaches to ocean and coastal spatial decision-making.

Speakers from private industry, government, and major asset stakeholders will address topics including:

• Incorporating resiliency into coastal design: case studies illustrating adaptable solutions integrating resiliency into coastal engineering;
• The status of state policy related to coastal resiliency and spatial planning;
• An update on the Office of Coastal Zone Management’s statewide study on impacts of sea level rise on wetlands; and
• Massport’s approach to addressing and incorporating coastal resiliency and marine spatial planning.

Program Co-Chairs

• Harlan Doliner, Counsel, Head of Maritime Group, Verrill Dana LLP
• Leslie-Ann McGee, Environmental Solutions, Battelle

Speakers

• Kirk F. Bosma, P.E., M.C.E., Team Leader/Coastal Engineer, Woods Hole Group
• Tricia Bowie, Massachusetts Office of Coastal Zone Management
• Bruce Carlisle, Director, Massachusetts Office of Coastal Zone Management
• Marc Carullo, GIS/Environmental Analyst, Massachusetts Office of Coastal Zone Management
• Julie Conroy, AICP, Senior Environmental Planner, Metropolitan Area Planning Council
• Paul Kirshen, Research Leader, Battelle
• Morgan McCarthy, Chairperson, Marine & Oceanographic Technology Network (MOTN)
• Steve Miller, Supervisor of Environmental Management Systems and Sustainability, Highway Division, MA Department of Transportation
• Robbin Peach, Program Manager of Resiliency, Massport