Enhancing Coastal Resilience Decision-Support Tools to Reflect Latest Local Applied Science - NERRS/NSC(NERRS Science Collaborative)

In this project, the Jacques Cousteau National Estuarine Research Reserve and Rutgers University, who have collaborated for more than a decade to develop coastal resilience tools, streamlined and enhanced existing mapping and decision-support tools for New Jersey coastal communities. The result was New Jersey Flood Mapper, an interactive, user-centered web tool that enables decision-makers to visualize exposure from coastal flooding hazards. The tool operationalizes a total water level concept developed by Rutgers climate resilience experts to allow planners to evaluate a range of flood conditions and time horizons. Enhanced map overlaps and data layers that show physical infrastructure, evacuation routes, and socio-demographic information are integrated into the tool to give a fuller picture of community vulnerability. New Jersey Flood Mapper offers coastal decision makers a go-to resource to assess and plan for potential risks to people and property from future storms and flooding. This catalyst project was funded by NOAA through the National Estuarine Research Reserve System Science Collaborative to advance collaborative science. It did not produce any new data.

Since Hurricane Sandy battered the New Jersey coastline in 2012, coastal decision makers have been inundated with data, tools, assessment techniques, and planning guidance to help them prepare communities to face future extreme storm events. Concurrently, the New Jersey Climate Adaptation Alliance, a network of policymakers, practitioners, academics, non-governmental organizations, and business leaders designed to build climate change preparedness in New Jersey, requested that Rutgers University convene a panel to identify planning options that coastal managers can use as part of resilience efforts. The panel suggested a framework for communities to apply a “total water level approach,” reflecting user-defined combinations of sea level rise and flood conditions and providing communities with additional flexibility to evaluate a range of flood conditions and time horizons for planning.

Project Lead

Lisa Auermuller

Jacques Cousteau National Estuarine

Research Reserve

(609) 812-0649 x204

auermull@marine.rutgers.edu

Project Type

Catalyst – Targeted investment for

advancing collaborative science

Project Collaborators

• Jacques Cousteau National

Estuarine Research Reserve

• Rutgers University

The distributor does not assume liability.

None

Cite this dataset when used as a source: NOAA retains the right to analyze, synthesize and publish summaries of the NERRS/NSC data. The NERRS/NSC retains the right to be fully credited for having collected and process the data. Following academic courtesy standards, the NERR site where the data were collected should be contacted and fully acknowledged in any subsequent publications in which any part of the data are used. The data enclosed within this package/transmission are only as accurate as the quality assurance and quality control procedures that are described in the associated metadata reporting statement allow. The user bears all responsibility for its subsequent use/misuse in any further analyses or comparisons. The Federal government does not assume liability to the Recipient or third persons, nor will the Federal government reimburse or indemnify the Recipient for its liability due to any losses resulting in any way from the use of this data. Requested citation format: NOAA National Estuarine Research Reserve System (NERRS) Science Collaborative(NSC).