1. Chesapeake Bay Dune Monitoring

The Chesapeake Bay Dune Monitoring project analyzed four years of biannual monitoring data at nine selected dune sites around Chesapeake Bay. The analysis included data taken before and after a major hurricane (Hurricane Isabel, September 18, 2003) impacted the sites. The study showed contradictory results which indicates the complexity of each individual system. Key results were:

• Dune sites are quite resilient to storm attack and generally recover quickly.
• The presence of nearshore bars add to the stability of a site but also result in highly mobile systems which are difficult to categorize. Nearshore attached bars are the deciding factor for stability. They provide the protection needed for the backshore and make sand available for aeolian transport necessary for dune creation.
• Preliminary studies showed that a dune system may serve a role in ground water quality remediation when the water is discharged into shallow ground water systems from upland landscapes that have demonstrated elevated nitrogen loadings.

2. Chesapeake Bay Shore Evolution

Additional work has continued in each jurisdictional dune locality to show the evolution and morphology of the shoreline and beach/dune systems. Shoreline evolution is the change in shore position through time. It is the material resistance of the coastal geologic underpinnings against the impinging hydrodynamic (and aerodynamic) forces. Along the shores of Chesapeake Bay, it is a process-response system. The processes at work include winds, waves, tides and currents, which shape and modify coastlines by eroding, transporting and depositing sediments. The shoreline is commonly plotted and measured to provide a rate of change but it is as important to understand the geomorphic patterns of change. Shore analysis provides the basis to know how a particular coast has changed through time and how it might proceed in the future.

The reports document how the Bay shore has evolved since 1937. Aerial imagery was taken for most of the Bay region beginning that year, and it is this imagery that allows one to assess the geomorphic nature of shore change. Aerial imagery shows how the nature of the coast has changed, how beaches, dunes, bars, and spits have grown or decayed, how barriers have breached, how inlets have changed course, and how one shore type has displaced another or has not changed at all. Shore change is a natural process but, quite often, the impacts of man through shore hardening or inlet stabilization come to dominate a given shore reach.

The aerial photo mosaics were created using GIS technology. The data is available within the reports generated for each jurisdictional locality. See the of reports below:

Norfolk, Northampton, Virginia Beach, Northumberland,
Accomack, Hampton, Lancaster, Mathews, Westmoreland