Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Northern Neck Regional Shallow Draft Channel Dredging Plan: Feasibility Phase, Donna A. Milligan, Cameron W. Green, C. Scott Hardaway Jr., Christine A. Wilcox, Claire M. Rae, Scott Lerberg, Alex Demeo, George Brooks, Mark Mansfield

Reports

The Initial Phase of the project (Phase 1), used remote sensing and other data collection to develop a method for determining which waterbodies on the Northern Neck of Virginia need dredging. The analysis included most of the waterbodies in the counties of Lancaster, Northumberland, Richmond, and Westmoreland. From this analysis, 19 waterbodies emerged as potentially needing dredged based on physical parameters and residential and economic usage (Milligan et al., 2023).

In this Feasibility Phase (Phase 2), more detailed site data were collected to provide data to the localities for consideration. These tasks were included in the analysis:

1. Historic shore …

Northern Neck Regional Shallow Draft Channel Dredging Plan: Initial Phase, Donna A. Milligan, Grace M. Massey, C. Scott Hardaway Jr., Christine A. Wilcox, Cameron W. Green, Mark Mansfield

Reports

The purpose of this project is to develop a regional dredging program for the localities of the Northern Neck. This report encompasses Phase 1 of the project, which included creating a database of waterbodies in Lancaster, Northumberland, Richmond, and Westmoreland Counties and the Town of Colonial Beach along the Potomac and Rappahannock Rivers and Chesapeake Bay. Generally, these waterbodies can be categorized into three basic types of shallow draft channels: federally-authorized to include aids to navigation (ATONS), non-federal with ATONS, and non-federal without ATONs. Along the Northern Neck, presently identified, are 13 federal channels, 37 non-federal channels in creeks with …

Future Of Great Salt Lake Survey, Lisa W. Welsh, Joanna Endter-Wada, Karin M. Kettenring, Anna Mcentire

Reports

The Future of Great Salt Lake Survey was conducted in fall 2022 when state and global attention on Great Salt Lake was ramping up, following record lows of the elevation of lake water levels. In the survey, we asked Utahns their opinions on securing water for Great Salt Lake and focused on strategies that individuals, local communities, and the state of Utah could pursue. When it comes to how water is used and managed in Utah, there are multiple actors and institutions who all make decisions and have authority or ability to take different actions. While the state of …

Over A Half Century Of Connecting Science And Management For Virginia’S Tidal Wetlands At The Virginia Institute Of Marine Science, Center For Coastal Resources Management, Virginia Institute Of Marine Science

Reports

Rivers & Coast is a periodic publication of the Center for Coastal Resources Management, Virginia Institute of Marine Science. The goal of Rivers & Coast is to keep readers well informed of current scientific understanding behind key environmental issues related to watershed rivers and coastal ecosystems of the Chesapeake Bay.

Occohannock On The Bay Living Shoreline Project, C. Scott Hardaway Jr., Donna A. Milligan

Reports

Presentation report on Occohannock on the Bay (Camp Occohannock) Living Shoreline restoration project.

Project Purpose:

Demonstrate living shorelines as cost-effective, hybrid green-gray infrastructure approach for protecting local communities from coastal hazards while enhancing coastal resilience and ecosystem health.

Project awarded ASBPA Best Restored Shore Award for 2023

Monitoring The Abundance Of American Shad And River Herring In Virginia’S Rivers 2021 Annual Report, Eric J. Hilton, Patrick E. Mcgrath, Brian Watkins, Ashleigh Magee

Reports

This report describes the results of the twenty-fourth year of a continuing study to estimate the relative abundance and assess the status of American shad (Alosa sapidissima) stocks in Virginia by monitoring the spawning runs in the James, York and Rappahannock rivers in spring 2021, evaluating hatchery programs, and contributing to coast-wide assessments (ASMFC 2007, ASMFC 2020).

We also report on two fishery independent monitoring programs using anchor gillnets in the Rappahannock River (year 4) and the Chickahominy River (year 7; a major tributary of the James River), to determine relative abundance and stock structure for the adult spawning run …

Monitoring The Abundance Of American Shad And River Herring In Virginia’S Rivers 2022 Annual Report, Eric J. Hilton, Patrick E. Mcgrath, Brian Watkins, Ashleigh Magee

Reports

This report describes the results of a continuing study to estimate the relative abundance and assess the status of American shad (Alosa sapidissima) stocks in Virginia by monitoring the spawning runs in the James, York and Rappahannock rivers in spring 2022, evaluating hatchery programs and contributing to coast-wide assessments (ASMFC 2007a; ASMFC 2020). We also report on a fishery-independent monitoring program to determine abundance and stock structure of river herring (A. pseudoharengus, and A. aestivalis) in Virginia by evaluating the adult spawning runs in the Chickahominy River, a major tributary of the James River, and the Rappahannock River. Further, a …

Drones In The Coastal Zone, Center For Coastal Resources Management, Virginia Institute Of Marine Science

Reports

Rivers & Coast is a periodic publication of the Center for Coastal Resources Management, Virginia Institute of Marine Science. The goal of Rivers & Coast is to keep readers well informed of current scientific understanding behind key environmental issues related to watershed rivers and coastal ecosystems of the Chesapeake Bay.

2022 Report To The Governor: Utah's Land, Water, And Air, Janet Quinney Lawson Institute For Land, Water, And Air

Reports

This report serves as a 2022 snapshot of key issues and concerns with Utah's shared resources. It highlights gathered data that is available to provide context to these issues, as well as identifies areas where more study is needed. Addressing these challenges will enable Utah policymakers and other statewide leaders to make informed decisions for the future. Under the authorship of 37 researchers and experts and the general guidance of 38 advisory committee members, the report outlines 26 issues and trends to pay attention to in the coming months and years.

Virginia Seafood Sustainability, Samantha E. Askin, Robert A. Fisher

Reports

Virginia’s commercial fisheries operate sustainability under a suite of management tools based upon information received from marine scientists and fishery managers who regularly conduct biological sampling of fish while tracking commercial landings and other gathering of required information. Analyses of fishing effort and overall stock conditions, as well as formulas designed to calculate threshold limits for maintaining sustainable stocks are regularly performed. Restrictions on seasons, size, days at sea, and gear are imposed as needed to achieve management supporting long-term biological sustainability.

Winter Harbor Dredge Channel Data Report, Donna A. Milligan, C. Scott Hardaway Jr., Christine A. Wilcox, Cameron Green

Reports

Winter Harbor is a tidal creek that flows between a sandy barrier system and an eroding marsh shoreline. It is an important waterway that provides access to the Chesapeake Bay from the Winter Harbor watershed. In the past, Winter Harbor Inlet was the only hydraulic connection from the Winter Harbor watershed and Chesapeake Bay. The two open water areas of Winter Harbor were separated by marsh channels that hydraulically connected to the mouth at the present-day Winter Harbor Inlet. The federally-defined channel at Winter Harbor was authorized by Congress in 1950. It was authorized as a 12 feet (ft) deep, …

Data Collection At Fifteen Selected Creeks In Support Of Shallow Water Dredging On Virginia’S Middle Peninsula - Methods & Data Report, Nicholas J. Dinapoli, Donna A. Milligan, C. Scott Hardaway Jr., Christine A. Wilcox, Cameron Green, Scott Lerberg, Eduardo J. Miles, Alex Demeo, George Brooks

Reports

Federal funding has been historically available for the Army Corps of Engineers for shallow draft navigation projects. However, past and recent subsidies have not provided ample funding at levels to sustain maintenance dredging for the 17 federal navigation channels on the Middle Peninsula. Further, funding for maintenance of non-federal channels has been historically neglected by the Commonwealth of Virginia until the Virginia General Assembly established the Virginia Waterway Maintenance Fund in 2018. For the past decade the Middle Peninsula Chesapeake Bay Public Access Authority, the Middle Peninsula Planning District Commission and its member jurisdictions, and the Virginia Institute of Marine …

Cedarbush Creek Dredge Channel Data Report, Donna A. Milligan, C. Scott Hardaway Jr., Christine A. Wilcox, Cameron Green

Reports

Cedarbush Creek is located in Gloucester County, Virginia. It is a long, but narrow creek that empties into the York River. The mouth is a wide embayment, but farther north, the creek narrows to about 400 feet wide and extends for about 1.5 miles to its marshy headwaters. Cedarbush Creek has never been dredged, but due to shoaling within the creek, it needs dredging to accommodate vessel traffic. Oliver’s Landing, located near the mouth of Cedarbush Creek, is a working waterfront that supports commercial and recreational boaters in Gloucester. (...)

Living Shoreline Design Guidelines For Shore Protection In Virginia’S Estuarine Environment, C. Scott Hardaway Jr., Donna A. Milligan, Karen Duhring

Reports

The Chesapeake Bay has about 6.5 million people living in its coastal counties and much of the shoreline is privately-owned. For communities along the shore, the continual shore retreat may be a problem. When land along the shore show signs of erosion, property owners tend to address it.

These guidelines are meant to address the need to educate consultants, contractors, and other professionals in the use of living shoreline strategies. It provides the necessary information to determine where they are appropriate and what is involved in their design and construction. The guidelines focus on the use of created marsh fringes …

Parrotts Creek Dredge Channel Data Report, Donna A. Milligan, C. Scott Hardaway Jr., Christine A. Wilcox, Cameron W. Green

Reports

Parrotts Creek is located along the Rappahannock River in Middlesex County, VA. The mouth of the creek is about 850 ft wide, but just inside the mouth of the creek, a spit extends from the upland narrowing the creek to about 300 ft before it widens again. Overall, this is a relatively short, undeveloped creek. Most of the development (wharfs, ramps, piers) occur near the mouth. Most of the more inland areas of the creek are surrounded by woodland. The federally-authorized channel was established in 1955 due to the presence of a public ramp and landing area, as well as …

Living Shoreline Sea-Level Resiliency: Performance And Adaptive Management Of Existing Sites Year 3 Summary Report, Donna A. Milligan, C. Scott Hardaway Jr., Christine A. Wilcox, Nick J. Dinapoli

Reports

The focus of this study was to research the resiliency of rock/sand/plant living shoreline protection systems. These systems have been used in Chesapeake Bay for 40 years to reduce erosion, protect infrastructure, and create habitat that is disappearing from the shoreline as sea level rises. The goal was to determine how they have been affected by storm surge and associated wind-driven waves, sea-level rise. This data informed adaptive management strategies to create site-specific morphologically-resilient projects.

The objectives of this 3-year project is monitoring the effectiveness of nature-based resilience projects over time such as those that use hybrid living shoreline management …

Expanding The Use Of Natural And Nature-Based Infrastructure To Enhance Coastal Resiliency, Marcia Berman, Pamela Mason, Jessica Hendricks, Tamia Rudnicky

Reports

The vulnerability of coastal communities and the growing risks of coastal infrastructure continue largely due to past and ongoing patterns of development in high risk areas. This project is focused on increasing the use of natural and nature-based features (NNBFs) to increase resilience of coastal communities to flooding caused by extreme weather events.

Dredging Implementation Prioritization And Management For Middle Peninsula Shallow Draft Channels, Donna A. Milligan, C. Scott Hardaway Jr., Christine A. Wilcox, Nicholas J. Dinapoli

Reports

To develop a regional dredging program for the localities of the Middle Peninsula, a database of 120 creeks and rivers was created of its waterbodies from Tappahannock to West Point. Generally, these waterbodies can be categorized into three basic types of shallow draft channels: federally-defined, non-federal with ATONs (aids to Navigation) and non-federal without ATONs. For the Middle Peninsula there are 13 federal channels, 12 non-federal channels in creeks with ATONs, and 94 in creeks without defined channels or ATONs.

Physical parameter data was collected or created for each of these creeks. This data included creek mouth morphology, amount of …

Monitoring The Abundance Of American Shad And River Herring In Virginia’S Rivers 2020 Annual Report, Eric J. Hilton, Patrick E. Mcgrath, Brian Watkins, Ashleigh Magee

Reports

This report describes the results of the twenty-third year of a continuing study to estimate the relative abundance and assess the status of American shad (Alosa sapidissima) stocks in Virginia by monitoring the spawning runs in the James, York and Rappahannock rivers in spring 2020, evaluating hatchery programs, and contributing to coast-wide assessments (ASMFC 2007, ASMFC 2020).

We also report on two fisheryindependent monitoring programs using anchor gillnets in the Rappahannock River (year 3) and the Chickahominy River (year 6; a major tributary of the James River), to determine relative abundance and stock structure for the adult spawning run of …

Nature-Based Solutions For Coastal Resilience, Center For Coastal Resources Management, Virginia Institute Of Marine Science

Reports

Rivers & Coast is a periodic publication of the Center for Coastal Resources Management, Virginia Institute of Marine Science. The goal of Rivers & Coast is to keep readers well informed of current scientific understanding behind key environmental issues related to watershed rivers and coastal ecosystems of the Chesapeake Bay.

Aberdeen Creek Dredge Channel Data Report, C. Scott Hardaway Jr., Donna A. Milligan, Christine A. Wilcox, Nicholas J. Dinapoli

Reports

Aberdeen Creek is located on the York River in Gloucester County, Virginia (Figure 1). At the narrow confluence of the York and Aberdeen, the creek takes about a 90-degree bend to the north (Figure 2) and widens to about 700 to 800 feet (ft) for about 2,000 ft. The creek then divides into two branches, one continuing north and one going east. These two prongs narrow quickly and become thin meandering tidal channels with adjacent marsh. The land use around the creek is mostly agricultural and wooded with some residential properties along its east side and along the York River …

Hog Island Shore Protection And Habitat Restoration Living Shoreline Project, C. Scott Hardaway Jr., Donna A. Milligan, Christine A. Wilcox, Nicholas J. Dinapoli

Reports

Hog Island is an emergent estuarine marsh complex that is part of the overall Guinea marshes (Figure 1). These marshes are located at the confluence of Mobjack Bay and the York River in Gloucester County, Virginia. Hog Island is a high wave energy eroding shoreline along its south-face on the York River, and lower wave energy along its west and east flanks that occur on Monday Creek (Figure 2). The marsh consists mainly of grasses such as Spartina alterniflora and Spartina patens. A higher, sandy area along the higher energy shorelines has some scrub shrub. Two small ponds and a …

Davis Creek Dredge Channel Data Report, C. Scott Hardaway Jr., Donna A. Milligan, Christine A. Wilcox, Nicholas Dinapoli

Reports

Introduction Davis Creek is located in Mathews County, Virginia (Figure 1) and empties into Mobjack Bay, a small bay in the lower Chesapeake Bay. The creek has a narrow mouth that splits into three prongs (Figure 2). The eastern prong is shortest at 2,200 ft from the mouth, and the western prong is the longest extending about 3,000 ft from the mouth. The Marina on Davis Creek occurs on this prong. Land use adjacent to the creek is mostly residential with some agriculture and wooded properties. The headwaters do not have extensive marsh. Instead the creek terminates soon after the …

Timberneck Creek Dredge Channel Data Report, C. Scott Hardaway Jr., Donna A. Milligan, Christine A. Wilcox, Nicholas J. Dinapoli

Reports

Introduction Timberneck Creek is located in Gloucester County, Virginia (Figure 1). It is a long, but narrow creek that empties into the York River. The mouth is a wide embayment, but farther north, the creek narrows to about 400 ft wide and extends for about 2 miles to its marshy headwaters. The interior of the creek is irregular with many very small lateral creeks/marsh drainages emptying into the Timberneck. Timberneck Creek has never been dredged and a federally-defined channel does not exist at the site. As a new dredging project, the channel design must balance safety, economic, and sustainability requirements. …

Hole In The Wall Dredge Channel Data Report, C. Scott Hardaway Jr., Donna A. Milligan, Christine A. Wilcox, Nicholas J. Dinapoli

Reports

Hole in the Wall (HITW) is located in Mathews County, Virginia (Figure 1). It is a natural channel between fetch-limited barrier islands that provides access from Chesapeake Bay to Milford Haven and Gwynn Island. Milford Haven is a unique tidal creek watershed occurring between Chesapeake Bay and the Piankatank River and consists of numerous lateral tidal creeks entering from Gwynn Island to the north and others entering from the south including Lanes Creek, Stutts Creek, Billups Creek, Stoakes Creek and Whites Creek (Figure 2). Presently, the barrier between Milford Haven and Chesapeake Bay includes the northern barrier and Rigby Island. …

Farm Resiliency Education For At-Risk Coastal Areas In The Chesapeake Bay, Kristen Saacke Blunk, Kristen Hughes Evans, Jennifer Miller Herzog, Julie Herman, Carl Hershner, Donna Bilkovic, Kirk J. Havens

Reports

The Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS) in collaboration with its partners, the Land Trust Alliance, Sustainable Chesapeake, and The Nature Conservancy, explored and refined questions critical for advising and guiding landowners who farm within coastal areas that are vulnerable to sea level rise and saltwater intrusion, and ultimately, loss of arable cropland in the Chesapeake Bay watershed. While the questions posed are those that agricultural experts across the coastal zones are struggling with, this effort focused on identifying the current state of the science and informational gaps; building current, best professional guidance for landowner conservation program choices; and developing …

Virginia Game Fish Tagging Program Annual Report 2019, Susanna Musick, Lewis Gillingham

Reports

Through 2019, the Virginia Game Fish Tagging Program (VGFTP) has maintained a 24-year database of records for tagged and recaptured fish. The program is a cooperative project of the Virginia Saltwater Fishing Tournament (VSFT) under the Virginia Marine Resources Commission-(VMRC) and the Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS) of the College of William and Mary (under the VIMS Marine Advisory Program).

Shoreline Management Handbook, Pamela Mason, Angela King, Clay Bernick

Reports

Shoreline habitats and processes are impacted by the decisions we make about managing coastal development and shorelines. Shoreline Management is making choices to address the desire to protect upland property from erosion or develop property balanced with the benefits and uses of natural and nature-based shoreline features and shoreline habitat restoration. This requires a weighing of the private benefits and cots of management actions and the benefits and costs to public held common resources, also known as the public trust. The natural features along our shorelines -tidal wetlands, beaches and dunes, and riparian buffers, are economically and ecologically valuable. They …

Monitoring The Abundance Of American Shad And River Herring In Virginia's Rivers - 2019 Annual Report, Eric J. Hilton, Robert Latour, Patrick E. Mcgrath, Brian Watkins, Ashleigh Magee

Reports

This report describes the results of the twenty-second year of a continuing study to estimate the relative abundance and assess the status of American shad (Alosa sapidissima) stocks in Virginia by monitoring the spawning runs in the James, York and Rappahannock rivers in spring 2019, evaluating hatchery programs, and contributing to coast-wide assessments (ASMFC 2007). We also report on two fishery-independent monitoring programs using anchor gillnets in the Rappahannock River (year 2) and the Chickahominy River (year 5; a major tributary of the James River), to determine relative abundance and stock structure for the adult spawning run of river herring …

Expanding The Use Of Natural And Nature-Based Infrastructure To Enhance Coastal Resiliency: Forecast And Hind-Cast Load Reductions From Living Shoreline Bmps : Project Report (Year 2 Of 3), Marcia Berman, Pamela Mason, Tamia Rudnicky

Reports

The vulnerability of coastal communities and the growing risks to coastal infrastructure continue largely due to past and ongoing patterns of development in high risk areas. This project is focused on increasing the use of natural and nature-based features (NNBFs) to increase resilience of coastal communities to flooding caused by extreme weather events. This project has proposed two efforts to increase understanding of NNBFS; 1) describe the current status, and 2) quantify role of NNBF creation/ restoration for water quality benefits in support of coastal resilience. The products of the 3-year project are intended to support informed coastal management decision-making …