Promotional logos created to encourage interest in resiliency building for NY’s Hudson and Long Island regions.

Contacts:

Kathleen Fallon, NYSG Coastal Processes & Hazards Specialist, E: kmf228@cornell.edu, P: 631-632-8730

Jessica A. Kuonen, Hudson Estuary Resilience Specialist, NYSG E: jak546@cornell.edu, P: (845) 340-3990 x323

New York Sea Grant and FEMA developed ArcGIS story map collections as tools to provide techniques to increase flood and erosion resilience in NY’s Hudson and Long Island regions.

Stony Brook and Kingston, NY, August 10, 2022 - New York’s coastal regions are experiencing rising sea levels, more frequent and intense storm events, and heavy downpours that can result in compounding hazards such as flooding and shoreline erosion. A lack of general knowledge about natural shoreline and watershed processes can lead to decisions that exacerbate these risks over time. Even when significant effort is dedicated to education and technical assistance for communities, the benefits may be lost over time due to turnover of elected officials, municipal staff, and the influx of new residents.

Through a Cooperating Technical Partnership between the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and New York Sea Grant (NYSG), the need for education for shoreline decisionmakers was recognized and addressed by developing ArcGIS story map collections for the Hudson and Long Island regions. The collections tell the complex story of climate risk alongside options for mitigative actions and related resources and tools. They are an engaging tool for risk communication that discuss the coastal processes and hazards that occur, how to increase resiliency through shoreline management, stories from the community, and other existing local resources.

NYSG conducted focus groups and interviews as part of a needs assessment to better understand shoreline decisionmakers’ (i.e., residents, municipal officials, and businesses) experiences with the risks and hazards of living on or working along the shoreline. This effort informed the development of the story maps by identifying what information was needed to assist communities and properties in becoming more resilient to flooding and erosion. An extensive review process, that included input from resilience practitioners, helped refine the story map collections and allowed tailoring them to the target audiences in each region.

A novel approach to branding and advertising the online resources was developed to improve the accessibility and uptake of these new resources for New York’s Hudson and Long Island regions.

Project Partner:

• Funding: Federal Emergency Management Agency

NYSG developed two new outreach products that assist decisionmakers in choosing shoreline and floodplain management options that can help increase resiliency.


More Info: New York Sea Grant

New York Sea Grant (NYSG), a cooperative program of Cornell University and the State University of New York (SUNY), is one of 34 university-based programs under the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Sea Grant College Program.

Since 1971, NYSG has represented a statewide network of integrated research, education and extension services promoting coastal community economic vitality, environmental sustainability and citizen awareness and understanding about the State’s marine and Great Lakes resources.

Through NYSG’s efforts, the combined talents of university scientists and extension specialists help develop and transfer science-based information to many coastal user groups—businesses and industries, federal, state and local government decision-makers and agency managers, educators, the media and the interested public.

The program maintains Great Lakes offices at Cornell University, SUNY Buffalo, SUNY Oswego and the Wayne County Cooperative Extension office in Newark. In the State's marine waters, NYSG has offices at Stony Brook University in Long Island, Brooklyn College and Cornell Cooperative Extension in NYC and Kingston in the Hudson Valley.

For updates on Sea Grant activities: www.nyseagrant.org has RSS, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube links. NYSG offers a free e-list sign up via www.nyseagrant.org/nycoastlines for its flagship publication, NY Coastlines/Currents, which is published quarterly.