Coastal Services Center

Current Projects

Community Resilience Coordination

Community resilience coordination entails overall resilience activities, including coordination, resilience partnership building, development and implementation of outreach and evaluation plans, and coordination of NOAA Coastal Service Center-funded resilience activities of partners. Current activities include planning and coordination of resilience panels for major conferences and partnership building with the Association of State Floodplain Managers, U.S. Chamber of Commerce, The Nature Conservancy, and the American Meteorological Society. Activities also include the funding and coordination of partner efforts, such as the Mobile Chamber of Commerce and resilience pilot projects in Texas and Louisiana. The NOAA Coastal Services Center is helping these communities develop resilience plans and resilience indices that will allow progress to be measured over time. (2007-2009)

IOOS Applications

The Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS) captures and delivers ocean-related data, making more data available to a wider audience. The goal of the IOOS Applications project is to demonstrate and promote the real-world value of IOOS data and the benefits of machine-to-machine data interoperability. Four projects are underway that demonstrate IOOS applications: the Chesapeake Bay Oyster Larvae Tracker (CBOLT), the Oregon Coastal Inundation Tool, the harmful algal bloom bulletin, and the coastal climatology project. This application project will showcase these tools to show how IOOS data are being used to make a difference. (ongoing)

Coastal Management Fellowship

Assistance was provided to these states through the Coastal Management Fellowship program. Postgraduate students selected as fellows receive professional, on-the-job education and training, while the states receive specific technical assistance for their coastal regulatory programs. Fellows spend two years at the host agency working on substantive state-level coastal issues that pertain to federal management policies and regulations. All states with federally approved coastal zone management programs, as well as states developing such programs for approval, are eligible to submit a project proposal to receive a fellow. (2008 update)

Resilience/RiskWise Networking Workshop

This workshop will bring together coastal resource managers, local planners, and emergency and floodplain managers working within the same region to help them obtain a better understanding of each other’s fields and to begin to leverage their respective efforts to foster coastal community resilience. Participants will work together to develop an understanding of reasons for networking and collaboration, mechanisms that are most effective to foster networking and collaboration, and a list of common management issues. (ongoing)

Climate Demonstration Project

While climate is an important factor for all coastal communities, coastal officials often don’t know where to access climate information or how to incorporate this information into their decision-making processes. Two pilot websites were developed for the Southeast to address this issue—one for recreation and tourism (www.cormp.org/climate/) and another for recreational and commercial fishing (www.coastalclimate.org). The content and utility of these sites will be reviewed in 2008, as well as the possibility of a pilot project for Pacific shellfish growers (www.nanoos-shellfish.org). (2005-2009)

Resilience/RiskWise Networking Workshop

This workshop will bring together coastal resource managers, local planners, and emergency and floodplain managers working within the same region to help them obtain a better understanding of each other’s fields and to begin to leverage their respective efforts to foster coastal community resilience. Participants will work together to develop an understanding of reasons for networking and collaboration, mechanisms that are most effective to foster networking and collaboration, and a list of common management issues. (ongoing)

Collaboration with NOAA Fisheries

The NOAA Coastal Services Center and NOAA Fisheries’ Office of Habitat Conservation (OHC) partner to help coastal managers and communities implement ecosystem-based management practices for coastal habitat conservation and restoration. Technical support and seed funding may be provided to support practitioners and professionals in collaborative habitat restoration and conservation planning. In 2008, the Center and OHC are hosting a workshop on barrier removal to achieve tidal hydrology restoration in the Southeast region. It will provide an opportunity for the restoration community to share lessons learned. From this workshop, technical guidance will be developed to enhance tidal hydrology restoration. (ongoing)

Habitat Priority Planner

This GIS-based tool developed by the NOAA Coastal Services Center is for conservation and habitat restoration planners and practitioners to test different alternatives for setting management priorities in a watershed, county, or small region. The tool can be used to evaluate and compare the effects of future land use, conservation scenarios, or proposed restoration projects on habitat quality. In 2008, training and updated outreach materials are being developed to support and facilitate the use of the tool, and pilot application products are planned for Maine, New York, and South Carolina. (2003-2009)

Implementing Ecosystem-Based Management in the National Estuarine Research Reserves: The Role of GIS

For this project, stakeholders in two research reserve sites, the ACE Basin in South Carolina and the Wells site in Maine, will get geographic information system (GIS) assistance as they develop strategic natural resource management plans for their geographic regions. One of the primary goals is to get the public to participate in the process. Efforts from the NOAA Coastal Services Center will focus on creative ways to highlight the value and threats to these resource areas. The Center’s Habitat Priority Planner tool will be used for this purpose. From this experience, information will be shared with other organizations on how to best use visualizations and other spatial data products to support ecosystem-based management. (2007-2009)

Coastal Elevation and Mapping

The NOAA Coastal Services Center works with state and local officials to collect and distribute high-resolution topographic and bathymetric data sets. This project works with the private sector to acquire new lidar data for coastal management applications such as the analysis of storm surge and storm inundation, erosion, and water flow. The project also works with state and federal partners to share costs and find multiple uses for coastal lidar data sets. In 2008, the focus of these efforts will be in Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, South Carolina, and Virginia. (2008 update)

Topographic and Bathymetric Applications

The NOAA Coastal Services Center provides information about the availability of topographic and bathymetric data sets and assists coastal managers in working with these sets—particularly in relation to storm surge and inundation modeling. The focus for 2008 is to develop a data inventory for Florida, Georgia, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia and to develop guidance documents describing the coastal management applications of topography and bathymetry. (ongoing)

Remote Sensing Training

The NOAA Coastal Services Center provides seminars and courses that demonstrate the use of remote sensing technology in a geographic information system (GIS) environment. For 2008, training will potentially be held in California, Florida, South Carolina, and Virginia and may be scheduled in other states. Training leaders also will coordinate with Center partners, such as the Nonpoint Education for Municipal Officials (NEMO) Network and the National Association of Counties, to provide remote sensing technology and tools training for their constituents. (2008 update)

Application of Integrated Coastal Management (ICM) Tool

The ICM Tool is a geographic information system (GIS)-based tool that, with a few basic data sets, can help inventory habitats, assess land and water habitat conditions, identify and rank potential restoration and conservation sites, and analyze “what if” scenarios for proposed changes in land cover. The tool is also capable of incorporating socioeconomic data and impervious surface analysis into the output. The Center is providing technical support to several states that are using the to ol as an aide to watershed planning. (2003-2009)

South Carolina Oyster Imagery Acquisition

The South Carolina Oyster project is a continuation of work begun in Fiscal Year 2003. The Center will continue to review and spatially validate imagery, as well as provide technical consultation support to the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources’ oyster mapping effort. Visit www.csc.noaa.gov/benthic/funding/active.htm. (2003-2007)

Topographic Change Mapping

High-resolution topographic and bathymetric data sets are being collected to fill the need of the coastal resource management community for accurate, timely information in the coastal regions. The project acquires and distributes airborne-derived topographic and bathymetric data (including seamless topo/bathy data), derived information products, and analysis tools for constituents of the Center. Visit www.csc.noaa.gov/crs/tcm/. (ongoing)

GeoTools

GeoTools is the conference series that focuses on the technical information needs of the nation's coastal programs. Through this conference, constituents of the NOAA Coastal Services Center learn about new ways to address coastal resource management issues through the effective use of geospatial data and tools. The conference is held every two years. Visit www.csc.noaa.gov/geotools/. (ongoing)

Climate and Weather Impacts on Society and the Environment 2 (CWISE2)

Organizations involved in this four-year cooperative agreement will study the physical, socioeconomic, and ecosystem impacts of sea-level variability and change. These organizations will also develop decision-support resources to help communities from Texas to Maryland increase resilience to impacts of erosion and inundation in a scenario of sea-level change. (2007)

Climate Demonstration Projects

Two pilot coastal climatology Web sites have been developed: one for recreation and tourism (www.cormp.org/climate) and one for recreational and commercial fishing (www.coastalclimate.org). Efforts will focus on outreach for these sites, including examples explaining how the sites can be used by their respective audiences based on client needs. (2005-2007)

Nonpoint Source Pollution and Erosion Comparison Tool (N-SPECT) Applications

N-SPECT is a GIS-based tool that allows users to input various development scenarios and predict impacts to water quality. Staff is working with coastal resource managers in these states to implement this technology. Visit www.csc.noaa.gov/crs/cwq/nspect.html. (ongoing)

NOAA Regional Collaboration Support

NOAA is furthering its commitment to providing relevant products and services to the nation. The NOAA Coastal Services Center has one or more members on five of the eight regional teams (Gulf of Mexico, North Atlantic, Pacific, Western, and Southeast and Carribean) developed to keep attuned to customer needs and deliver applicable NOAA products and services. The Center also serves on two of NOAA's four priority area task teams (hazard-resilient communities, and outreach and communications). (ongoing)

Land Cover Mapping

Nothing provides a big picture view of land cover status better than these maps, which are developed using remote sensing technology. The NOAA Coastal Services Center has baseline land cover data for most of the coastal zone. The goal is to update the imagery every five years to also provide a means of detecting change or trends. The data is available free of charge from csc.noaa.gov/landcover.

Completed Projects

Beach Nourishment on the Atlantic and Gulf Coasts of the U.S.

This project helps state and local governments along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts of the U.S. make informed decisions about the nourishment of beaches by consolidating the best scientific and technical information and tools for evaluating and understanding beach nourishment into one source. This resource is a user-friendly Web site that includes relevant information and tools from the fields of coastal geology, engineering, economics, law and policy, and the biological sciences.

Characterization of the Ashepoo-Combahee-Edisto (ACE) Basin, South Carolina

To assist the state and local governments that manage environmental resources within the ACE Basin, this project produced a flexible, user-friendly source of information, data, and management tools. The resulting CD-ROM integrates diverse information about the area’s physical characteristics, ecology, history, socioeconomics, and management. This project was led by the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources and was conducted in partnership with the Center.

Charleston Metro Chamber of Commerce Business Development Group

A Center program, the Center for Technological Innovation (CTI), merged its operations with the Business Development Group within the Charleston Metro Chamber of Commerce. CTI, a natural fit for the Chamber, was an “incubator” for high-tech business. CTI provided many services to start-up companies, including industry analysis, market assessment, start-up expertise, and capital resource networking.

Coastal Land-Use Techniques Training Program

Funding from this project was utilized to develop and implement a training program for local policy makers. Topics include coastal issues and the tools and techniques available to address these issues, plus the legal aspects of using local government power. This project was funded with a special project grant from the Center.

Coastal Management Fellowship

A Coastal Management Fellow worked with the South Carolina Office of Ocean and Coastal Resource Management to refine its existing post-storm recovery plan using a geographic information system (GIS) database. The database will expedite the decision-making and public notification process regarding the condition of beachfront structures after a major storm.

Coastal Management Fellowship

A Coastal Management Fellow worked with the South Carolina Office of Ocean and Coastal Resource Management to assess the technical capabilities and information needs of local governments within the coastal zone. The fellow established an information distribution mechanism to effectively serve the needs of local governments by providing recommendations and findings from agency-generated research. The fellow also developed a planning information management system to aid staff in understanding and using information about new and innovative coastal research, and developed a procedure and mechanism for integrating information into the agency’s policy development and permit review processes.

Coastal Management Fellowship

A Coastal Management Fellow is working with the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control, Office of Coastal Resource Management, on a project entitled "Storm water Management System Inspection Program." The project includes assessment of current storm water management procedures, legal analysis of maintenance and inspection requirements, baseline field inspections of systems, and fiscal analysis of inspection programs.

Coastal Ocean Habitat Project

The Coastal Ocean Habitat Project generated Center data products that utilized satellite observations of U.S. coastal waters. A CD-ROM of retrospective satellite sea-surface temperature images for the southeastern U.S. was produced in 1996.

Coastal Technology Services

Coastal Technology Services establishes coalitions of the Center and government agencies, academic institutions, and private and nonprofit organizations to develop and test prototype decision-making tools and information products for coastal management, and to demonstrate and verify existing and lab-proven coastal and marine technologies. Full-scale pilot projects involve design and development of a prototype, field application and evaluation with end users, final product development, and training.

CZMA Bibliographies

The Center's library has cataloged NOAA's Coastal Zone Information Center collection, produced by state coastal management programs under the Coastal Zone Management Act (CZMA). This collection contains documents that span a number of coastal topics and includes brochures, management plans, and legislative information. A bibliography of this information for the State of South Carolina is available.

Development Costs and Benefits of Coastal Growth Patterns

The goal of this project is to demonstrate to the Growth Options Partnering Committee, as well as to local governments and the development and real estate communities, that developing coastal lands in an efficient, responsible manner will profit the developer equally, if not more, than if the same lands were developed in an indiscriminant manner. The aim of the project is to perform a growth costs study using spatial data and geographic information system (GIS) technology and then report the findings to the committee. This project was funded with a special project grant from the Center.

Digital Shoreline of South Carolina CD-ROM

The Digital Shoreline of South Carolina CD-ROM delivers the most current and accurate depiction of South Carolina’s shoreline in various formats for use in geographic information system (GIS) software packages. Coastal resource managers may use these data to better understand the shoreline of South Carolina. The source data range from 1:10,000 to 1:20,000, with the large scale being useful for viewing detailed information. The shoreline maps used as the source of the digital data were created from tide-controlled photography, thereby giving users a static glimpse of conditions at mean high tide throughout the state. This project was a joint effort between the Center and the National Geodetic Survey.

Educating the Public through their Children

This project fosters citizen support for recommendations of the Clean Water Task Force and Beaufort County's Special Area Management Plan (SAMP) by educating children who, in turn, will educate their parents about the protection of their water resources. Specifically, the project informs students of the progress, findings, and recommendations of SAMP and helps them conduct their own studies. Residents from local retirement communities volunteer to assist students with water measurements and monitor biological projects.

Estuarine Habitat Project

The Estuarine Habitat project investigated remote sensing and modeling approaches for studying oceanic and terrestrial processes. This project focused on building new, useful methodologies and applications to aid coastal managers in assessing estuarine habitat quality.

Lessons Learned Regarding the Use of Spatial Data and GIS during Hurricane Floyd

During and after Hurricane Floyd, the NOAA Coastal Services Center worked with local, state, and federal coastal resource managers and emergency preparedness officials to document spatial data and information needs and uses. The resulting document is a best practices manual filled with information that can be of use to all coastal communities.

Ocean Color Applications Project

Through this project, processing and classification techniques were developed to evaluate coastal water quality and biological and geologic variables based on remote sensing data from satellite or aircraft. Data on the bio-optical characteristics of diverse U.S. coastal waters were collected. These data are used to validate satellite measurements used for ocean color data products.

Ocean Planning Information System (OPIS)

OPIS is the first system to provide the coastal management community in the southeastern U.S. with access to regional georeferenced spatial data and legal information. Major features of the OPIS Web site include an interactive mapping application, marine and coastal spatial data, data and metadata download tools, Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC)-compliant metadata, and legislative summary pages, all designed to support regional ocean management. In 2001, OPIS received a Hammer Award, a vice-presidential acknowledgment of projects and people that help government operate more efficiently and effectively.

Oyster Resources Mapping Pilot Study

The South Carolina Department of Natural Resources, the Town of Hilton Head Island, and the Center initiated a pilot study to evaluate the uses of analog and digital imagery for detecting and mapping intertidal oysters.

Protected Areas GIS (PAGIS)

The PAGIS project brought compatible geographic information systems (GIS), geographic data management, and Internet capabilities to each of the nation’s 25 Estuarine Research Reserves and 13 Marine Sanctuaries. Through PAGIS, the reserves and sanctuaries also developed advanced data sets, underwent extensive training, and found innovative ways to make the most effective use of their new data and technological capabilities.

Shoreline Data Rescue

GIS-compatible shoreline data sets that include high-resolution contemporary and historic shorelines are available from the Center’s Web site. The source of the historic shoreline data is NOAA t-sheet charts dating from the 1800s. This information is most frequently used to measure shoreline change.

South Carolina Land Cover and Change CD-ROM

South Carolina’s Coast: A Remote Sensing Perspective is a two-volume CD-ROM set that demonstrates the utility of information acquired by satellite and airborne remote sensing systems for coastal South Carolina. Coastal resource managers may use this information to detect land-use trends, document shoreline dynamics, and educate the public. The CD-ROMs also contain geographic information system (GIS) tutorials explaining how to access and manipulate the data, examples on how the data can be used to address coastal resource issues, and tools to aid in the data analysis.

South Carolina Land Cover and Change Data

This project mapped terrestrial land cover in coastal watershed environments and identified changes in these areas that occurred between 1990 and 1995. The project relied on satellite multispectral imagery as the primary information source. These data were used to distinguish major land cover classes, and previous images were studied to locate areas that changed over time. For this project, the data were acquired according to the Center’s Coastal Change Analysis Program (C-CAP) methods.

South Carolina Oyster Restoration and Enhancement Program

The South Carolina Oyster Restoration and Enhancement (SCORE) program organizes volunteers and students to restore and enhance oyster habitats, establishes and promotes oyster shell recycling by the community, and fosters education by using constructed reefs as living classrooms. The SCORE Web site provides project information and includes interactive on-line tools for recording and analyzing monitoring data from the restoration sites. This project is part of NOAA’s community-based restoration program, led by NOAA Fisheries.

Southeast Coast and Ocean Margin Program (SEACOM)

The Center is leading an effort to enhance understanding of the significant natural resources in the South Atlantic Bight, a region extending from Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, to Cape Canaveral, Florida, out to the edge of the continental margin. The program is investigating significant natural resource areas, compiling this information into a spatial data framework, and working to inform and educate the public about the importance of discovery and management of these resources. The long-term goal is to provide an information foundation that allows managers to maintain economic vitality in the region while sustaining natural resources for future generations.

Spatial Wetland Assessment for Management and Planning (SWAMP)

This GIS-based model helps coastal resource managers prioritize wetland habitats within a watershed. This ability also is helpful when addressing wetland restoration issues. SWAMP was originally developed for the Ashepoo-Combahee-Edisto (ACE) River Basin, South Carolina, but the general approach is transferable to other geographies.

Topographic Change Mapping

High-resolution Light Detection and Ranging (LIDAR) measurements of coastal beach topography were made during 1996, 1997, and 2000. These measurements can be used for beach change studies and are available to the public.