By Bill Hassell
On January 18, people from Rockaway Beach and neighboring communities were invited to a presentation called “Coastal Futures” by University of Oregon Assistant Professor of Climate Change Resilience, Ignacio Lopez Buson and his Master of Landscape Architecture students, Inanna Hencke, Jessie Crown, Justin Mouledous, Leo Frampton and Lucy Gonzalez. Coastal Futures depend on developing connections between ecology and community. North Coast Communities for Watershed Protection (NWWCP) hosted this event with participation from the Wild Salmon Center and the Oregon Coalition for an Environmental Rights Amendment (OCERA).
For the past three months, his students have visited and analyzed Rockaway Beach, meeting with local people to understand the values and challenges of the community. Some of these challenges include coastal erosion, sea level rise, deforestation, drinking water quality, and urban development. This presentation and mapping focused on their research regarding sustainable coastal practices and explore paths for long-term resilience. This research is supported by the 2024 Sustainability Fellows Program and funded as part of the Pacific Northwest Just Futures Institute that supports faculty doing community-engaged teaching and research.
Landscape Architecture is the design of outdoor spaces and combines art and science. It is the profession that designs and manages our land. The assignment for this class was to make a hypothetical plan for the future of Rockaway Beach. For the first month, the students used research and geographic information systems (GIS) to analyze the town’s natural environment, potential environmental threats to the area, and the town’s demographics and economy. They then used large scale planning to outline a direction the community could consider over the long term.
The students divided the Oregon coast into six unique ecological regions. Rockaway Beach is an ecoregion called the coastal uplands. Before the 1900’s the area was dominated by old growth forests of Sitka Spruce, Western Red Cedar and Western Hemlock with some of the trees growing to over one thousand years old. And a dense understory of younger trees and shrubs completes the old growth area. Chinook salmon would swim from the ocean upstream to reproduce. But a lot of the woodlands are now covered with young Douglas Fir with little understory as a result of logging companies harvesting and replanting a single species.
Their presentation detailed the dual threats faced by the area, including oceanic hazards such as tsunamis and storm surges, and terrestrial risks like landslides and habitat fragmentation. Proposed solutions emphasized resilience through community parks, hiking and biking trails, wildlife crossings, and wetland preservation to enhance biodiversity and flood mitigation.
The discussion also highlighted the importance of responsible land development outside tsunami zones and safe drinking water access, as well as the challenges posed by the timber industry. During the Q&A session, community members expressed concerns about economic impacts and the need for stronger regulations regarding land use and environmental protections, while action items included further studies on natural features and the potential hiring of professionals for informed decision-making.
There 95 people attending this presentation in person and 29 viewing online. Jane Scott filmed the event and it will be available at https://janescottvideoproductions.com/TCTV_on_Demand.html
For more information, visit NWWCP at http://healthywatershed.org
