About the project
Soft coastlines represent major regions of population and biodiversity. They are threatened by rapid environmental and population growth. To date, understanding of the resilience both environmental and community systems are based on short (<150yr) records. This research will combine long (600yr) sources of evidence found in documentary and sediment archives.
Coastal erosion and flooding are natural processes and a global hazard threatening the property and livelihood of two billion people. Looking forward, the impacts of changes in climate are overwhelmingly adverse. In Europe, 16% of the coastline is crumbling, while in the UK 13% (4077km) of the coastline is eroding, threatening heritage, coastal communities and placing stress on national budget. The frequency of coastal flooding is forecast to increase, resulting in changes in national governments’ response to coastal management to include managed retreat or abandonment.
There are important questions raised by the scale and timing of coastal settlement losses, most notably the impacts on local-regional-national and international trade, impact on shipping and the economic viability of communities living at the coast.
This project will address these questions through detailed analysis of specific coastal communities on the east coast of England, with the aim of developing a methodology for analysis and communication of coastal change and community response over 600 years, which coincides with the highest rates of coastal change and settlement loss in the last 900 years. The key innovative feature of the project is that it will correlate evidence drawn from historical documentary sources with data derived from palaeoenvironmental and geoarchaeological surveys. Historical sources offer precise dating and allow us to measure the social, cultural and economic impact of inundation, the latter permits us to precisely quantify the impacts and type of coastal change – for example establishing rates of change in surrounding landscape and coastal environments.
Additional supervisor: Prof Mark Bailey.
