Interactive Tool Gives Virginia Communities Data on Economic Effects of Marshes and Living Shorelines

Chesapeake Bay marshes and living shorelines play important roles in the ecosystem and benefit nearby communities. They help reduce damage from storms, remove excess nutrients from the water, and-by providing habitat for fish-they support commercial and recreational fishing.

But changing conditions can threaten marshes and living shorelines. NOAA Fisheries and partners, including the Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS) work to restore these important places. Restoration specialists need to analyze lots of information to decide where and how to implement living shoreline projects.

VIMS researchers developed a tool that individual land owners, communities, and resource managers can use to help them make decisions about projects in Virginia's Middle Peninsula . The Middle Peninsula is one of NOAA's Habitat Focus Areas -places where NOAA partners with local communities to improve fish habitat and support economies.

VIMS's online interactive SHORE-BET tool calculates ecosystem and economic benefits for marsh restoration projects. Knowing the benefits that land owners and communities would get from projects can help decision makers prioritize where to allocate funding. In recent months, close to 2,000 visitors have explored the tool.

"SHORE-BET is among the first tools to combine economic, ecological, and spatial data in an accessible online platform designed to help coastal decision-makers evaluate the community benefits provided by marshes and living shorelines," said Dr. Donna Bilkovic, a professor at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science.

Information Helps Decision Makers

Users can enter information for a project in a specific location along the Middle Peninsula's shorelines. This includes how long the project is along the shoreline and the amount of low and high marsh that will be restored. The tool then calculates the economic benefits the project would provide annually as well as a 30-year total community benefit value.

Information the tool generates includes dollar value from:

• Reduced storm impacts
• Improved fish habitat
• Nutrients removed or stored
• Improved recreational fishing

This data can help decision makers understand the financial outcomes of investing in restoration to see if it is a good fit for their communities.

"Shoreline management decisions can have important impacts on communities in the region, such as supporting recreation and protecting property," noted Dr. Andrew Scheld, associate professor at VIMS. "By translating those benefits into dollars, it helps us better understand tradeoffs and make informed management decisions."

Why Are Marshes So Important?

In Virginia's Middle Peninsula , a recent Virginia Institute of Marine Science study estimated marshes and living shorelines provide roughly $90 million in annual benefits to local communities . The biggest contributor to that number is reducing potential damages from storms.

Notably, Middle Peninsula recreational anglers value marshes and living shorelines highly. In fact, they value these habitats more than any other shoreline habitat. Living shorelines generate three times as much value for anglers than armored shorelines like bulkheads and riprap revetment.

A NOAA Fisheries Chesapeake Bay Fisheries Research Program grant supported VIMS researchers' work to estimate the monetary value of ecosystem services provided by marshes and living shorelines in the Middle Peninsula and to develop the SHORE-BET tool.