Importance of decadal scale variability in shoreline response: examples from soft rock cliffs, East Anglian coast, UK

Brooks, Susan; Spencer, T.

doi:10.1007/s11852-013-0279-7

Cited by 14 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 69 publications

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“…The different shorelines were then analysed through DSAS, deriving the End Point Rate (EPR) statistic which measures the average annual change (m a −1 ) between a pair of shorelines (Thieler et al, 2009). EPR for the period 1992-2013 provided a broad indication of the rate of change of shoreline position in the recent period and EPR statistics for the periods 1992-2000 and 2000-2010 permitted this record to be decomposed to show decadal-scale, historic assessments of shoreline change (for further discussion see Brooks and Spencer (2013)). These measures thus allowed the immediate shoreline change (NSM) associated with the storm surge impact to be set in a range of longer-term contexts.…”

Section: Horizontal Positioning Of the Shorelinementioning

confidence: 99%

Southern North Sea storm surge event of 5 December 2013: Water levels, waves and coastal impacts

Spencer

Brooks

Evans

et al. 2015

Earth-Science Reviews

158

127

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The storm surge event that affected the coastal margins of the southern North Sea on 5-6 December 2013 produced the highest still water levels on record at several tide gauges on the UK east coast. On east-facing coasts south of the Humber estuary and north-facing Norfolk, water levels were higher than in the twentieth century benchmark surge event of 31 January-1 February 1953. Maximum significant wave heights were highest off the North Norfolk coast (peak H s = 3.8 m offshore, 2.9 m inshore) and lowest off the Suffolk coast (H s = 1.5-1.8 m inshore); comparable offshore wave heights in 1953 were 7-8 m and ca. 3 m. The lower wave heights, and their short duration, in 2013 explain both localised breaching, overtopping, and back-barrier flooding associated with gravel ridges and relatively low earthen banks as well as the lack of failure in more highly-engineered coastal defences. On barrier coasts and within estuaries, the signal of maximum runup was highly variable, reflecting the modification of the tide-surge-wave signal by inshore bathymetry and the presence of a range of coastal ecosystems. The landscape impacts of the December 2013 surge included the notching of soft rock cliffs and cliffline retreat; erosion of coastal dunes; and the augmentation or re-activation of barrier island washover deposits. Whilst surge event-related cliff retreat on the rapidly eroding cliffs of the Suffolk coast lay within the natural variability in inter-annual rates of retreat, the impact of the surge on upper beach/sand dune margins produced a pulse of shoreline translation landwards equivalent to about 10 years of 'normal' shoreline retreat. The study of east coast surges over the last 60 years, and the identification of significant phases of landscape change -such as periods of rapid soft rock cliff retreat and the formation of new gravel washovers on barrier islands -points to the importance of high water levels being accompanied by high wave activity. Future developments in early warning systems and evacuation planning require information on the variable impacts of such extreme events.

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Section: Horizontal Positioning Of the Shorelinementioning

confidence: 99%

Southern North Sea storm surge event of 5 December 2013: Water levels, waves and coastal impacts

Spencer

Brooks

Evans

et al. 2015

Earth-Science Reviews

158

127

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Over the meso‐term, Figure A suggests strongly differentiated differences in retreat rates between large recession in the 1990s and much slower landward migration in the 2000s. This is the local expression of a regional landform response signal on the UK east coast, detected not only in the retreat rates of the soft rock Weybourne‐Sheringham cliffs at the eastern margin of the study frontage, but also along clifflines of similar morphology on east‐facing southern North Sea coasts at Covehithe, Suffolk and Walton‐on‐the‐Naze, Essex (Brooks and Spencer, ). At Scolt Head Island, these differences cannot be explained by differences in storm surge event frequency; Table shows that there were three such events in the period of high retreat compared to four events in the low retreat period.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 72%

“…Late summer vertical aerial photography from 1992, 2000 and 2008, obtained from the UK Environment Agency, was used to assess shoreline change for the periods 1992–2000, 2000–2008 and 1992–2008 (1992 also represents the first year of such data collection by the Agency). These periods were chosen as analysis elsewhere on the UK East Coast, including the Weybourne cliffs at the eastern end of the study area, has shown that these first two periods reflect clearly delineated periods of enhanced and reduced storminess, respectively (Brooks and Spencer, ). Shoreline retreat was quantified using an identical methodology to that used for the short‐term analysis described earlier.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Reconstructing and understanding the impacts of storms and surges, southern North Sea

Brooks

Spencer

McIvor

et al. 2016

Earth Surf Processes Landf

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Coastal barriers are ubiquitous globally and provide a vital protective role to valuable landforms, habitats and communities located to landward. They are, however, vulnerable to extreme water levels and storm wave impacts. A detailed record of sub-annual to annual; decadal; and centennial rates of shoreline retreat in frontages characterized by both high (> 3 m) and low (< 1 m) dunes is established for a barrier island on the UK east coast. For four storms (2006-2013) we match still water levels and peak significant wave heights against shoreline change at high levels of spatial densification. The results suggest that, at least in the short-term, shoreline retreat, of typically 5-8 m, is primarily driven by individual events, separated by varying periods of barrier stasis. Over decadal timescales, significant inter-decadal changes can be seen in both barrier onshore retreat rates and in barrier extension rates alongshore. Whilst the alongshore variability in barrier migration seen in the short-term remains at the decadal scale, shoreline change at the centennial stage shows little alongshore variability between a region of barrier retreat (at 1.15 m a À1 ) and one of barrier extension. A data-mining approach, synchronizing all the variables that drive shoreline change (still water level, timing of high spring tides and peak significant wave heights), is an essential requirement for validating models that predict future shoreline responses under changing sea level and storminess.

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“…The coastline of South East England is a region of enormous ecological and economic importance, and is also unique from an environmental standpoint, given the natural variety of its shoreline, which includes a mosaic of salt marshes, soft cliffs, and sand dunes [37][38][39][40][41][42].…”

Section: Study Sitementioning

confidence: 99%

A Numerical Investigation on Tidally Induced Sediment Transport and Morphological Changes with Changing Sea Level in South-East England

Leonardi

Carnacina

2019

Geosciences

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The impact of tide-induced morphological changes and water level variations on the sediment transport in a tidally dominated system has been investigated using the numerical model Delft3D and South-East England as a test case. The goal of this manuscript is to explore the long-term changes in morphology due to sea level rise and the large-scale morphodynamic equilibrium of the South-East England. Our results suggest that the long term (century scale) tidally-induced morphological evolution of the seabed slows down in time and promotes a vanishing net transport across the large scale system. Century-scale morphologically updated simulations show that both morphological changes and net transport values tend to decrease in time as the system attains a dynamic equilibrium configuration. Results further suggest that the presence of a gradual increase in mean sea level accelerates the initial morphological evolution of the system whose morphological rate of change gradually attains, however, same plateau values as in the absence of sea level rise. Given the same base morphology, increasing water levels enhance residual currents and the net transport near the coastline; and vice-versa, decreasing sea levels minimize both residuals and net transport near the coastline. The areas that are more affected by, water level and morphological changes, are the ones where the net transport is the highest. This manuscript explores and allows extending the idea of morphodynamic equilibrium at a regional scale, larger than the one for which this concept has been generally explored i.e., estuarine scale.

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Importance of decadal scale variability in shoreline response: examples from soft rock cliffs, East Anglian coast, UK

Cited by 14 publications

References 69 publications

Southern North Sea storm surge event of 5 December 2013: Water levels, waves and coastal impacts

Southern North Sea storm surge event of 5 December 2013: Water levels, waves and coastal impacts

Reconstructing and understanding the impacts of storms and surges, southern North Sea

A Numerical Investigation on Tidally Induced Sediment Transport and Morphological Changes with Changing Sea Level in South-East England

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