GOING, GOING … gone?

MSU program to use resident submissions to track Lake Michigan shoreline erosion

Above, in this MSU RS&GIS drone photo of the west end of the Manistique boadwalk, shoreline erosion and the subsequent damage to the walkway is shown. The Great Lakes, including Lake Michigan, are at record-high lake levels and causing significant coastal damage for communities located alone shorelines. Below, another MSU RS&GIS drone image shows Lake Michigan’s affect at Roger’s Park in Thompson. Courtesy photos

Above, in this MSU RS&GIS drone photo of the west end of the Manistique boadwalk, shoreline erosion and the subsequent damage to the walkway is shown. The Great Lakes, including Lake Michigan, are at record-high lake levels and causing significant coastal damage for communities located alone shorelines. Below, another MSU RS&GIS drone image shows Lake Michigan’s affect at Roger’s Park in Thompson. Courtesy photos

MANISTIQUE – Michigan State University recently hosted a virtual Zoom workshop to gather feedback from local officials and residents about current coastline perceptions from the Manistique community. Similar workshops are being held in other coastal communities throughout the state as Great Lakes water levels rise and shorelines diminish.

According to Erin L. Bunting, director and assistant professor of RS&GIS (remote sensing and geographic information system) in the MSU Department of Geography, Environment, and Spatial Sciences, the workshop was part of a coastal management project funded by the National Science Foundation. The multi-year project will work within six communities in Michigan – Manistique is the second community and Marquette was the first. Other communities or counties include Iosco County and South Haven.

“(We are looking) to develop a robust citizen science program across the state of Michigan focused on coastal image data collection and analysis,” she said. “Many portions of the Great Lakes are at recordhigh lake levels and there is a need to better monitor the induced change. Our approach is to involve the community in such monitoring through drone and cell phone-based image collection.”

 

 

Bunting explained that the program will utilize Federal Aviation Administrationlicensed remote pilots in each affected community to fly drones and collect highresolution aerial imagery.

“At the same time, we will have a mobile app, set to be released in January, that people can use to collect geotagged photos of coastal hazards in their community,” he said. “With this imagery we can rapidly show coastal hazard impacts to communities, develop a database of landscape change and coastal hazards, empower communities through more information of such a critical topic, and, with time, develop models of coastal vulnerability.”

For the workshops, Bunting said, key stakeholders in coastal communities are tapped for input and participation.

Above, in this MSU RS&GIS drone photo of the east end of the Manistique boadwalk, the walkway is rendered nearly invisible after being overtaken by sand and debris. High water levels in Lake Michigan have caused significant damage to the area’s shoreline in the past two years. Courtesy photo

Above, in this MSU RS&GIS drone photo of the east end of the Manistique boadwalk, the walkway is rendered nearly invisible after being overtaken by sand and debris. High water levels in Lake Michigan have caused significant damage to the area’s shoreline in the past two years. Courtesy photo

“We are focusing on individuals that are part of the decision-making process in terms of coastal management and monitoring,” he explained. “However, all citizens in the community can become citizen scientists by downloading our mobile app in January.”

For the Manistique workshop, Bunting noted that there were 18 people registered, including individuals from state and local government, engineering firms, and MSU Extension. The topics discussed included shoreline history, mapping activity, use of drones, data collection applications, and also used focus groups for more in-depth conversation.

“We ran exercises to map perceptions of coastal vulnerability and another to highlight what people know about different types of coastal hazards,” Bunting explained. “In the middle of the day, we ran three focus groups all related to coastline change, decision making, and vulnerability. The workshop included talks on shoreline history, shoreline monitoring with drones, drone safety, citizen science in general, and the technology deployment. There was also a question-and-answer session to further engage with participants.”

Overall, Bunting said the intention of this initial workshop was to introduce the program to the area’s residents.

“This is the beginning of our engagement with the community,” he explained. “From this we wanted people to know that MSU is studying coastal change in this area and that we want community involvement. The data and scientific information that we generate from the citizen science monitoring will be provided back to the community to support coastal decision making. It is our hope that we can empower the community to document their coastal conditions and then add value to that documentation in the form of scientific analyses that provide recommendations for management actions and strategies.

One of the most important pieces of this workshop is defining where we will monitor with drone flights. Through the mapping activity the community helps us define those area,” Bunting continued. “Additionally, the focus group provides us information on how the community perceived coastal change and hazards, how they are handling the extreme lake levels, and a socioeconomic perspective on the coastal history.

He added that MSU will continue to work with the community throughout the gathering and dissemination process.

“We are not just coming in to collect data and walk away,” Bunting explained. “All imagery collected from the workshops will be disseminated, for free, to the community. Through our website we are also open to fielding questions. We are not coming in to push policies or monitoring approaches, but, rather, provide data and information that you all can use. This citizen science data is valuable and novel providing already processes and analyzed imagery to the public in a very rapid fashion.

With satellite imagery, another common alternative to coastline monitoring, there is no control on when the data are collected and there is extensive pre-processing prior to analysis,” he continued. “The other goal of our project is to develop a sense of community between the citizens of Manistique (and the other communities we are working in) and our scientific team. We want folks to ask us questions and be engaged in the scientific process. We want our science to be useful and want to work with the community to make that happen!”

Bunting added that the public is welcome to visit the program website, rsgis.msu.edu, where project data is released

“We would love for the community to take our survey at https:// bit.ly/2K2varp,” she said. “It is open to anyone that did not partake in the workshop and will provide important information and community opinions about your coasts. It’s a great way to still be involve in the project from the beginning and we would really appreciate any input.”

Ethan J. Theuerkauf, Ph.D. and assistant professor Department of Geography, Environment, and Spatial Science at Michigan State University, said that he wants to stress is that the “overarching goal of this project is to get data and information back into the hands of the community members of Manistique.”

“We, as scientists, have a particular set of skills and expertise that we think add value to the planning and management process and we truly want to help the community make better decisions,” Theuerkauf explained. “We want to become a part of the community rather than just come in do our work and leave. We hope to do that by teaching members of the community to collect their own data about coastal changes and then working directly with decisionmakers to understand what the data tell us about coastal processes and expected future conditions. Ultimately, we want the information to be used by Manistique to make sustainable management decisions that help mitigate the mitigate negative consequences of coastal hazards.”

According to Manistique City Manager, Sheila Aldrich, the workshop proved to be a beneficial tool for the community.

“We learned at the workshop that a grant had been procured by their group that would allow them to purchase equipment and employ personnel to monitor the Lake Michigan shoreline,” she explained. “They showed us some of the drone footage they had already taken of the shoreline in the Schoolcraft County and Manistique area. They will also be developing a website to make public the information and photos they have acquired to help depict what has happened along the shoreline. They will continually be adding to this information and identify changes for future use.

The city engineers and all of us at the city will use the information for monitoring what is happening with the water level on the Lake,” she continued. “We will also use it for planning future repairs and for infrastructure projects (ex. boardwalk and campground) on the Lake Michigan shoreline.”

For more information on the program visit rsgis.msu.edu.

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