When Rising Seas Hit Home, an analysis by the Union of Concerned Scientists employs an interactive information product to convey assessments related to contemporary and projected coastal resiliency challenges. Integrated products like this make complex topics easy to consume and comprehend by a broader and less technical audience. Telling the story effectively is critical to shared context leading to implementation of sustainable solutions.
The value of using integrated information products has not been lost on the New Jersey engineer community as four nor’easters recently left a trail of power outages, downed trees, damaged facilities and localized flooding for communities along the eastern seaboard. Less than two weeks prior to these storms. the New Jersey Post of the Society of American Military Engineers (SAME) hosted a “Pathways to Coastal Resilience Climate Change” event.
Many of the ideas and lessons learned shared during the New Jersey Post event used geospatial science and art to visually describe the operating environment including infrastructure, environment, weather and human activity data. Inspiring action aimed at strengthening resiliency first requires a level of shared situational awareness.
No matter the mission, “Visualizing Better Decisions” may be achieved by employing the right data, tools and partnerships. Thanks to the SAME New Jersey Post for inspiring action!
For those interested in joining the SAME Geospatial Working Group, navigate to the Community of Interest Contact List located at the bottom of the Facility Asset Management Committee webpage. Once there log-in with your SAME member account and select the box next to the Geospatial Working Group to add it to your profile. We look forward to supporting the entire SAME team in “Visualizing Better Decisions.”
Related Resources:
- SAME Resilience Committee
- SAME Facility Asset Management Committee and Geospatial Working Group
- Full Report: When Rising Seas Hit Home: Hard Choices Ahead for Hundreds of U.S. Coastal Communities(July 2017), Union of Concerned Scientist.
- Full Report: The US Military on the Front Lines of Rising Seas(2016), Union of Concerned Scientist.
- Article: “Erosion is creeping toward Alaska’s coastal radar sites.”
Contributed by Lt. Col. David Foster, M.SAME, USA (Ret.), and Garry Zettersten P.E., M.SAME, Co-Chairs-Geospatial Working Group, SAME Facility Asset Management Committee.
