Policy and Priorities
Five main focus areas were specifically identified for Islamorada:
There are four general categories of adaptation strategies:
- Avoidance: This limits new development or infrastructure in areas that are vulnerable to sea level rise by redirecting development to less vulnerable areas. These types of strategies can be implemented through Transfer of Development Rights (“TDRs”), conservation easements, setbacks, and other mechanisms.
- Accommodation: Accommodation strategies acknowledge the long-term effects of sea level rise on an area, while implementing short-term measures to maintain existing uses. Examples of accommodation strategies include elevating a structure, drainage modifications, green infrastructure, and floodgates, among others.
- Protection: Protection adaptation strategies focus on protecting land from inundation, erosion, or storm-induced flooding through the construction of various structures such as jetties, groins, living shorelines, bulkheads, and beach nourishment. These structures preserve a static shoreline, which may provide a short-term solution to the long-term impacts of sea level rise. Many of these strategies are already commonly used in Florida, including: periodic beach renourishment projects which have had varying levels of success in maintaining coastal beaches; bulkheads constructed by private homeowners to stabilize their properties; and dikes that protect public infrastructure, low-lying communities, and environmentally-sensitive areas.
- Retreat: Retreat strategies allow for natural shoreline migration through land conservation and the removal of structures that prevent shoreline movement (e.g. dikes, berms and bulkheads).