Climate Ready Coast - Southern Maine

Climate change in coastal southern Maine is causing rising seas, stronger storms, and more severe coastal hazards like erosion, threatening people, homes, infrastructure, and natural resources. Climate Ready Coast - Southern Maine was a 2.5-year planning project focused on enhancing coastal resilience planning, fostering collaboration, and advancing adaptation action within Maine's ten southern-most coastal communities. The project engaged municipalities, local land trusts, regional conservation organizations, and federal and state natural resource entities to assess the impacts of climate change in the study region, address regional coastal resilience needs, and develop adaptation strategies and nature-based solutions for making our coastal areas more resilient to climate change and natural hazards.

In addition to developing a regional coastal resilience plan, the project sought to bolster local and regional capacity through continued and advanced regional  partnerships for coastal resilience efforts. Additional objectives included:

• Coordinate on common priorities and leverage existing data, resources, and tools;
• Enhance understanding of multi-hazard impacts and vulnerabilities; and
• Develop strategic priority projects and opportunities for advancing regional resilience through coordinated conservation efforts, sound land use planning, tailored yet transferable adaptation policies, and nature-based solutions.

This resulting regional coastal resilience plan summarizes the project, presents key findings, and provides guidance and resources for enhancing the resilience of vulnerable areas and assets within southern Maine. At the outset of the project, stakeholders indicated that their top needs for building local coastal resilience were guidance documents and resources, funding, and improved coordination. This plan was developed to address those needs. It was designed to serve as a roadmap for guiding future coastal resilience and adaptation action, be user-friendly and implementable, and provide many of the components necessary for developing future projects and grant applications to advance resilience efforts in the region.

This regional resilience plan is organized in 9 sections, with information and work products that are most relevant for developing future projects and/or informing grant proposals presented first. Supporting information about the project, including descriptions about process, is presented later in the plan. Major work products are listed in orange text.

1. Project overview
2. List and interactive map of priority vulnerable areas
   1. Profile sheets summarizing site conditions and vulnerabilities of each area
   2. Visual renderings of example nature-based adaptation projects for each area
3. List and interactive map of 'hot spots' of vulnerability
4. Coastal adaptation strategies - examples of and information about locally relevant and appropriate coastal adaptation strategies
   1. Coastal adaptation strategy matrix
5. List of federal, state, and private funding opportunities for future coastal resilience projects
6. Information needs, data gaps, and future studies
7. Summary of stakeholder engagement efforts and key findings
8. Regional vulnerability assessment overview and link to vulnerability assessment mapping tool
9. Project workshop materials

You can scroll through the plan one section at a time in sequential order or click on the section headings in the navigation bar at the top of the page to quickly jump to sections of interest.

This section lists 35 'hot spots' of vulnerability that were identified as having high exposure to coastal flood hazards, a high co-occurrence of vulnerabilities, and regional and/or local importance by the project team, Working Group, and Advisory Committee and that were not selected as the 15 priority sites noted in the section above. Although these 35 'hot spots' were not selected as the 15 priority sites for development of adaptation strategy renderings, they are still priority areas of coastal vulnerability and resilience action for the region.

Scroll through the list to view profile sheets summarizing conditions and vulnerabilities at each site and explore the interactive map to view the locations in relation to flood hazards. The list order organizes sites geographically from southwest to northeast.

For more information about how the 'hot spots' were selected, please see the "Stakeholder Engagement" and "Project Workshop Materials: Workshops #3 and #4" sections.

(Note: photos of sites and all updated profile sheets will be added to thumbnails in scroll list and basemap will be slightly modified to improve readability)

In order to advance coastal resilience efforts in southern Maine, communities, land trusts, natural resource management entities, and adaptation practitioners need guidance and resources. Specific input received via the survey, interviews, and project workshops regarding information needs to support adaptation efforts and needs that should be addressed in this regional coastal resilience plan included:

• Nature-Based Solutions (NBS) - Where and how can we leverage the natural environment to better protect against hazards?
• Stormwater Management - How can we use green infrastructure and low impact development to manage stormwater?
• Regulatory Solutions - What options exist with real regulatory "teeth"?
• Best Practices - What are high-impact, low-effort strategies that can be implemented in the region?
• Social-Ecological Resilience - How can we ensure that both communities and ecosystems benefit from adaptation strategies?

The project team, with support from consultant SWCA, developed a matrix (link below) of adaptation and resilience strategies, with a focus on NBS, that that could be used to address coastal hazards and vulnerabilities and enhance the resilience of our coastline. The matrix was developed based on best practices, regional expertise, and strategies that have been utilized in Maine and other geographies that have similar conditions.

For each strategy, the matrix outlines information about the type (e.g., nature-based, hybrid, gray), hazard addressed, general site conditions under which appropriate, limitations, maintenance, cost, and co-benefits provided. The second tab of the matrix presents information about regulatory and permitting considerations for different types of adaptation projects.

Managed retreat, or the strategic shifting of development away from coastal areas that are high-risk of hazards, including flooding and erosion, is an important and necessary approach for long-term coastal resilience. It is also a potentially complicated and contentious one that carries with it important legal, sense of place, community value, and economic considerations.

Discussions about and visioning for managed retreat were identified by project stakeholders as needs for regional resilience planning and important topics for this regional resilience plan to address. In fact, when asked what coastal hazard mitigation approaches (e.g., shoreline hardening, elevation of structures and infrastructure, nature-based solutions, etc.) they would like to see more of in the region over the next 10-30 years, stakeholders overwhelming indicated they wanted to see a lot more development directed away from at-risk areas. Proactively starting conversations about managed retreat at the regional and municipal and local levels is an important next step for advancing coastal resilience planning in southern Maine.

The graphic below shows what managed retreat could look like along a generic section of southern Maine's coastline. Click on the image to increase its size.

Equitable coastal adaptation requires prioritizing disadvantaged and socially vulnerable communities in engagement, planning, and investment efforts. These frontline communities face heightened levels of risk from climate impacts and have fewer resources to respond. One way to incorporate equity into coastal resilience planning and implementation is to consider the following:

• Procedure: who participates in planning and decision-making processes?
  • E.g., Are frontline communities involved? How are decisions made and by whom?
• Recognition: whose knowledge, values, and priorities are reflected in resilience plans and strategies?
  • E.g., Is local and Indigenous ecological knowledge incorporated? Are the needs and aspirations of frontline communities included?
• Distribution: who benefits from resilience efforts and who pays?  
  • E.g., Will housing costs and property values change? Have potential risks like gentrification been addressed and mitigated? 

Another important aspect of ensuring equity is to evaluate and incorporate both ecological benefits and social considerations in coastal adaptation planning. For example, how are human health, wellbeing, culture, economy, recreation, education, and public access impacted or improved by resilience strategies? What are the likely impacts to water quality, habitat, carbon sequestration potential, and hazard protection?

One of the largest barriers to implementing coastal resilience projects in southern Maine identified by stakeholders via survey and interview responses is funding for resilience projects. Stakeholders also noted that this regional resilience plan should include information about funding options to support resilience projects. To assist communities with awareness of current funding opportunities, the project team assembled a list (linked below) of federal, state, and private grant and funding programs that could be used to support all stages of coastal resilience projects, including planning, site assessment, engineering and design, implementation, land acquisition, and monitoring. For each funding opportunity, the list provides information about goals, eligible uses, funding limits, and links to more information.

Limited capacity was also noted by stakeholders as a top barrier to undertaking resilience projects. Municipal staff have to balance competing priorities and do not have the bandwidth to take on additional work related to coastal resilience and adaptation efforts. To help address this challenge and build capacity over time, members of the project team are committed to continue building momentum for regional and local coastal resilience efforts, facilitating regional coordination and collaboration, and providing assistance to communities for project development, grant writing, and implementation to the extent possible. Members of the Climate Ready Coast project team will organize and facilitate a continued regional working group for interested project Working Group and Advisory Committee members in order to advance coastal resilience. Team members and project partners (e.g., members of the Advisory Committee) are also actively investigating and pursuing opportunities to enhance capacity at the state, regional, and local levels for resilience planning and action.

The following list outlines information gaps and potential future work that were identified as needs and possible next steps for supporting coastal resilience efforts in southern Maine. They were identified over the course of the Climate Ready Coast project by the project team, Working Group, and Advisory Committee. This list serves as a menu of potential future efforts for project partners to pursue at a regional and/or local level.

• Regional Working Group - There was great enthusiasm for forming a coastal resiliency regional working group through which municipalities and organizations can collaborate, learn from one another, and form ongoing relationships. 
  • A regional structure will facilitate collaboration and resource sharing among municipalities and organizations. Regional collaboration may reveal economies of scale and other efficiencies that make coastal resiliency efforts more feasible.
  • Stakeholders noted that a regional approach could open the door for engagement with a broader audience, including with the general public.
  • Additionally, stakeholders noted that it is easier to propose policies and ordinances that neighbors are also pursuing. Having similar ordinances across municipalities creates a level playing field for attracting development and promoting stronger hazard mitigation and environmental protection.
  • Lastly, bringing smaller land trusts together will expand capacity to conserve land at a larger scale and allow for a more coordinated and regional prioritization scheme.
• Community Conversations - A regional conversation could be a valuable opportunity to start shifting dominant community attitudes to allow for long-term adaptation strategies, such as managed retreat.
• Coordination with County Officials and other Plans - Working with county officials (e.g. emergency management officials) can help municipalities leverage federal funding.
  • Connect coastal resilience initiatives to hazard mitigation planning, especially county hazard mitigation plans.
• Trainings -Top training needs include
  • Communicating risk and engaging the public and stakeholders in resilience planning.
  • Financing coastal resilience planning and climate adaptation.
  • Best practices for incorporating nature-based solutions (NBS), such as green infrastructure and living shorelines, into resilience planning.
  • NBS design and construction guidance for engineers and practitioners.
• Protection of Future Coastal Habitat - protection of future coastal habitat areas that are not currently conserved, especially those areas that have the potential for high density buildout and that intersect with high value habitat.
  • Areas that intersect the coastal hazards are priorities for conservation and zoning restrictions since future development would be vulnerable in these areas, and wildlife and habitat values are impacted by development.
  • High value habitat with low hazard exposure but has the potential for high density development are also areas that are important for conservation and zoning restrictions.
• Evacuation Routes - Updated evacuation route data and modifications to evacuation routes, some of which are in areas exposed to flooding from the 1% annual chance event and sea level rise.
• Tidal Restrictions - There are numerous tidal crossings within the project region that are either current restrictions and/or are projected to be with future sea level rise. There are also numerous railroad embankments, crossings, and gas lines through tidal marsh and flood hazard areas. Enhancing these crossings to enable adequate tidal flow, reduce flood risk, and improve habitat health is an important coastal resilience strategy.

• Nature-Based Solutions - Where are nature-based solutions (NBS) suitable in southern Maine?
  • What type of NBS projects (beach/dune restoration, nourishment, living shorelines, marsh restoration and enhancement, etc.) are appropriate and effective in southern Maine and in what coastal environments?
• Public vs. Private Investments & Benefits - Improved understanding of relevant considerations associated with implementing resilience projects on public vs. private land – cumulative impacts, public investment vs. private benefit, investment on private property that has impacts and consequences, either positive or negative, for public property.
• Coastal Resilience and Public Access - Relationship between implementing resilience projects and providing public access.
  • Working waterfronts, harbors, public access areas.
• Scale and Impact of Projects - Scale of adaptation actions and cumulative impacts - individual property scale isn’t going to cut it unless lots of adjacent individual properties.
• Habitat Data - Improved quality, accuracy, ‘up-to-datedness’, and accessibility of coastal habitat data.
• Enhanced Modeling of Coastal Hazards & Studies of Impacts
  • Improved, dynamic sea level rise modeling that accounts for things like wave action and the presence and elevation of bridge decks and other structures.
  • Future coastal erosion projections.
  • Sea level rise impacts on groundwater rise and saltwater intrusion on local groundwater supplies, drinking water sources, natural ecosystems, and infrastructure.
  • How will beaches be impacted by future sea level rise? Will/how landward migration of beaches occur when not adjacent to/hindered by the built environment or other limitations (e.g. steep slope, different adjacent habitat type, etc.)?
• Social Vulnerability Data and Methodologies - Improved data, both quantitative and qualitative, about social vulnerability information in coastal Maine. Currently, the Maine Social Vulnerability Index provides the best quantitative data and uses US Census block group level data, which is too coarse and has a margin of error too great for sufficient analysis and understanding of local vulnerabilities.
• Impacts of Tidal Restoration Activities on Upstream Flooding - How might enhancing existing tidal restrictions to improve tidal flow impact upstream flooding, especially of developed areas, stormwater management, and habitats?

A foundational component of this project was to complete a regional coastal vulnerability assessment that examined impacts of costal flood hazards on the built, social, and natural environments and develop a web mapping tool showing the results of the assessment. To that end, the project team engaged a consulting firm that specializes in GIS work, GEI Consultants, to conduct the assessment and assist with developing the associated mapping tool.

The project team developed a framework and methodology for the assessment based on stakeholder feedback gathered through the survey and interview process noted above as well as Working Group input provided during the project kickoff workshop. The Advisory Committee also provided guidance and input. The draft assessment and mapping tool were presented to the Working Group and Advisory Committee during a virtual workshop in June 2022 and subsequent refinements were made to the tool based on input collected during the workshop

Additional details and workshop materials can be found in the "Project Workshop Materials" section of this plan.

The final web mapping tool presents geospatial data of pertinent coastal hazards, key wildlife and habitat areas, conserved lands, infrastructure, and socio-economic conditions for the purpose of visualizing and understanding the co-occurrence of hazard exposure and impacts, vulnerabilities, and resilience considerations. It provides information about the proximity of coastal hazards in relation to areas of interest, including conserved lands, social service sites, and critical infrastructure. Additionally, it includes data layers resulting from a vulnerability assessment that evaluated what is exposed to coastal hazards, assessed what the partial vulnerability is of some of those things that are exposed, and identified where there are co-occurrences of things that are significant for coastal resilience. 

Thee mapper organizes geospatial data layers within 6 main categories:

1. Coastal Hazards - Sea level rise, regulatory floodplain (1% annual chance event), and overtopping potential of shoreline structures and dunes  
2. Infrastructure - Roads, tidal crossings and dams, building footprints, critical building types 
3. Social & Economic - Maine Social Vulnerability Index rankings, public transit, and public boat launches
4. Wildlife & Habitat - Areas of significant wildlife and vegetation habitat and potential future saltmarsh habitat
5. Vulnerability Assessment Results - results of a coastal flooding vulnerability and exposure analysis for infrastructure, buildings, and wildlife and habitat areas
6. Build-Out Analysis - parcels impacted by coastal hazards and estimated development potential within each study community based on parcel sizes and the current zoning requirements for minimum lot size

Explore the interactive mapper (linked below) to investigate coastal hazard exposure, flood vulnerabilities, and learn about the natural, built, and social characteristics of vulnerable areas.

•  Reference Document: Regional Vulnerability Mapping Tool  - summary document outlining data layers included in the mapping tool and the vulnerability assessment scoring approach used for layers. The organization structure of the document corresponds to how information in the web mapping tool is presented.
•   Regional Vulnerability Assessment Methodology  - Technical memo of the GIS analysis for the regional assessment.

The kickoff workshop for the project Working Group (WG) was held virtually on October 27, 2021. The purpose of the event was to introduce the WG to the project and to each other; familiarize participants with regional, state, and national resources, including the NOAA Digital Coast, that can help with resilience planning efforts; and gather input from the WG about needs for the regional vulnerability assessment and overall project.

•  Workshop Notes 
•  Workshop Presentations 
• Participant Handout

The project team and GIS consultant that assisted with the vulnerability assessment and web mapping tool held a virtual workshop to present the assessment and draft mapper to the Working Group (WG) and Advisory Committee (AC). The objectives of the event were for the WG and AC to use their knowledge and expertise about local and regional vulnerabilities to coastal hazards to evaluate the draft mapper and assessment outputs; become familiar with and practice using the web mapping tool; provide initial feedback on the mapping tool and assessment outputs; and for the project team to collect qualitative information from the WG and AC to ground truth the assessment and make it more robust.

Following the workshop, the project team held two optional virtual support sessions in July that WG members could attend if they wanted additional guided experience using the web mapping tool and/or wanted additional information about the vulnerability assessment.

•  Workshop presentation 
•  Summary of changes to draft web mapping tool  - summary of suggested changes and comments provided by WG and AC members about the draft tool and how the project team addressed them.

Three sub-regional virtual workshops were held with Working Group (WG) members for the project team to present an initial list of vulnerability 'hot spots' in each sub-region that were identified using the results of the regional vulnerability assessment. The team also created and shared profile sheets of each of those 'hot spots' to summarize the site conditions and characteristics based on quantitative information from the assessment.

WG members were asked to provide input about each of the sites located in their respective sub-regions, based on their local knowledge and expertise. They were also asked to ground truth the 'hot spots' and let the team know if any important local vulnerable areas were missing from the initial list or if any sites the team identified could be removed from the list. Using the input WG members shared during the sessions, the project team refined the draft profile sheets for each vulnerability ‘hot spot’ and created new profile sheets for any areas that the WG identified as important vulnerable areas that weren’t included in the project team’s preliminary list of hot spots.

•  Presentation: Kittery & York 
•  Presentation: Ogunquit, Wells, Kennebunk, & Kennebunkport 
•  Presentation: Biddeford, Saco, Old Orchard Beach, Scarborough 

A full day, in-person workshop was held with Working Group (WG) and Advisory Committee (AC) members to identify 15 priority vulnerable areas for which to develop visual renderings of example nature-based adaptation solutions. The process entailed applying criteria to a list of 50+ areas that were identified as hot spots of vulnerability in Workshop #3 in order to whittle down that list to 15 locations. The 15 sites were selected based on their local and regional significance, exposure to coastal hazards, present vulnerabilities, and how representative they are of other vulnerable sites across the region. The number of locations for which renderings could be developed was driven by the project budget.

For more information about the process to identify the 15 priority sites, please see the "Stakeholder Engagement" section of this plan.

•  Workshop Presentation 
•  Workshop Notes  - detailed workshop notes, including participant input for narrowing down priority sites
•  Master list of vulnerability "hot spots"  - full list of vulnerability "hot spots" and short-listed hot spots based on vulnerability assessment results and Working Group and Advisory Committee input
•  List of 15 Priority Vulnerable Areas for Adaptation Renderings  - 15 sites selected by workshop participants through an iterative process using a suite of criteria

The project team would like to express its sincere gratitude and appreciation to everyone who participated in the Climate Ready Coast - Southern Maine project. Special thanks to members of the Working Group and Advisory Committee for their time, meaningful participation, and invaluable input.

• Core Team Members
  • Abbie Sherwin, Southern Maine Planning & Development Commission (SMPDC)
  • Dr. Jessica Brunacini, Maine Sea Grant
  • Jacob Aman, Wells Reserve
  • Annie Cox, Wells Reserve
  • Dr. Chris Feurt, Wells Reserve
  • Kristen Grant, Maine Sea Grant
  • Julia Maine, SMPDC
• Supporting Team Members
  • Danielle Boudreau, NOAA Office for Coastal Management
  • Gwen Shaughnessy, NOAA Office for Coastal Management
  • Maggie Peard, UNH Sustainability Fellow, SMPDC
  • Karina Graeter, SMPDC
  • Marissa Fink, Resilience Corps Fellow, SMPDC
  • Aliyah Kingsley, SMPDC summer intern

The Climate Ready Coast Adaptation Strategy Matrix was heavily informed by the  Cape Cod Commission's Adaptation Strategies Matrix , which was developed as part of the Commission's Resilient Cape Cod project. That project also developed  fact sheets summarizing a variety of adaptation strategies , which are wonderful resources that could inform projects in southern Maine.

For more information about the Climate Ready Coast - Southern Maine project or the regional coastal resilience plan, including assistance using the plan or any of the project work products, please contact Abbie Sherwin, SMPDC Coastal Resilience Coordinator, at asherwin@smpdc.org.