good evening thank you for joining us to learn more about our ongoing Beach feasibility assessment if you are joining us in person thank you for taking the time out of your evening if you are watching this online We Appreciate You tracking the study and tuning in to learn more in this short
presentation we will go over introductions and the purpose of the beach feasibility assessment as a part of adopting a long-term Beach management plan we will then discuss background information on the importance of beach monitoring and the history of beach monitoring in maluia County as well as
provide results of a data analysis on the health and state of our beaches finally we'll present preliminary Beach user survey data on the over 12,000 respondents that we had to our beach user survey in closure we will talk about the next steps of the assessment
and after the conclusion of this presentation we encourage everyone to walk around to the breakout stations and learn more and ask questions I'm Jessica Fentress the coastal director for blushia County I've been with blushia County for over nine years and extremely passionate about having a
resilient Shor line for generations to come speaking with me today will be Dr Christopher Bender Dr Bender directs the Coastal Engineering Group at Taylor engineering over his 22-year career he has taken a leading role in the simulation and evaluation of Hurricane
surch wave mechanics and loading loral processes Shoreline protection and sediment transport Dr Bender serves on the American Society of civil engineers Coastal Engineering research Council and has taught Coastal Engineering courses
at the University of North Florida as a part-time faculty member the purpose of this Outreach meeting is to discuss the County's feasibility study on Coastal management this initiative funded by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection aims to assess current conditions and
explore effective strategies for preserving and protecting our Co line during this presentation we will examine historic Shoreline Trends to understand long-term changes share insights from our first Coastal user survey to reflect
Community priorities explore potential long-term solutions for Coastal management and resilience and discuss next steps in how we can move forward together your voice is a crucial part of this process we encourage you to join one of our breakout stations after this
presentation to provide feedback this is more than just a study it's about shaping the future of vucha County's beaches and ensuring they remain a vibrant and valued resource for generations to come the beach environment is a dynamic
environment with small changes occurring every tide cycle when reviewing how a beach adapts over the years or recovers after storm events it is industry practice to look at beach changes over time in order to recommend resilient solutions that will withstand not only
seasonal changes but the long-term impacts of erosion and accretion before we dive into the results of an analysis of our beach condition it is important to first understand how the data is collected and what benchmarks are reviewed to
determine Beach Trends professional surveyors collect contour and Beth themetry data at monuments set by the state of Florida approximately every 1,000 ft along our Coastline very similar to how mile markers can be found on high ways the survey data is then
analyzed by Coastal scientists and Engineers to document the Beach's conditions these Beach surveys provide Insight on many things including the current conditions of the beach how it responds to Coastal improvements how the beach reacts and recovers from
significant storm events and which areas of our Coastline are in critical need the first Beach survey for the county occurred in 1972 And since then there have been 31 Beach surveys collected these surveys have varied spatial extents and coverage
across the county in recent years the county has prioritized the collection of annual and postevent Beach surveys to better document the beach and understand how its conditions are changing these surveys and their corresponding reports are indicated by EX's in a report icon
on the timeline while this individual survey and Report represents a snapshot in time analyzing the data from various surveys cumul relatively provides the Insight needed to make long-term Beach management decisions understand how a beach is
performing and how the coastal area may be changing over time our team of coastal scientists and Engineers analyze multiple parameters to study Dune changes we analyze the approximate Dune pill position and the maximum Dune elevation this allows us to understand
how the Dune may be growing or if it is eroding away next we look at the shoreline position which we Define using the mean high water elevation this tracks the Beach's seaword limit to understand the available space to recreate and the amount of protective
buffer we look at the beach width and average burm elevation across the profile these are bounded by the dunco position and the shoreline position the last major parameter we analyze is volume of sand we Analyze This across
multiple delineators such as above me high water which quantifies the s aial or dry Beach changes and from mean high water to minus 15 ft navd88 Contour to describe the sub aquous or Nearshore
changes after these results are calculated we analyze them both across Shore in the landward seaword direction and along Shore the approximate north south Direction along the coasta these directions are shown on the
ground now let's go over the comparison used in this study we had 32 surveys to choose from but the special coverage of these surveys varies When selecting which survey to analyze it was crucial to focus on those that cover the entire County and represent significant time
periods the team decided to focus on four key comparisons the first is from June 1988 to August through October 2024 this comparison looks at the Beach's performance and evolution over approximately 35 years
we didn't include the surveys before June 1988 because their coverage was limited to shallower depths or didn't span the entire length of the C next we have the comparison from August 2003 to August through October 2024 this
represents a 20-year period and is particularly important because the August 2003 survey was taken before the 2004 hurricanes the first major storms to hit the county in decades the third comparison is from June 2016
to August through October 2024 this one captures an 8-year period focusing on the Beach's response before and after Hurricane Matthew in 2016 as well as several other significant storms finally we have the comparison from November
2022 to August through October 2024 this represents the most recent two years and shows how the beach has recovered after hurricanes Ian and Nicole in 2020 but before the impacts of hurricane Milton at the time of this study data
from Hurricane Milton wasn't available for analysis however it has been examined since the start of the study and is documented in a separate Lo now that we've selected our surveys for comparison we need to decide how to analyze the data there are several ways
we can assess the changes one way is to look at the changes in Beach wi from one survey to the next for example from 1988 to 2003 we see a significant increase in Beach width the area of the beach located in between the tow of the doom
and mean high water but from 2003 to 2016 there's a noticeable decrease in Beach then from 2016 to 2022 we see a dramatic drop in Beach width mainly due to the impact of several major storms in
the most recent period from 2022 to 2024 we see the beach width start to increase again another important approach is to compare each survey to the 2024 survey to track long-term changes in the beach when looking at Trends along the
shoreline something interesting stands out for example in the comparison between 1988 and 2024 you see a net neutral change in Beach width across the County however if you break it down into local
level the northern three communities actually saw a decrease in Beach while communi south of Daytona Beach saw an increase in beach so while countywide it looks like only small changes have occurred there's actually a lot more happening when you look closer it's also
worth noting that beach width is influenced by both the position of the seaword bone and the Doom toe sometimes an increase in bone width may be caused by The Retreat of the dun toe so we need to carefully consider these factors when
analyzing the data let's continue to take a look at the cumulative trends at a long-term scale here we have broken the trends down to also include a quick visual reference with plus signs indicating positive
actions and minus signs indicating negative movement generally on a countywide scale minimal changes in Beach width occurred during the 1988 the 2024 comparison period while significant decreases in Beach width occurred during
the 2003 to 2024 and 2016 to 2024 comparison period this indicates that since 2016 the decrease in Beach width has accelerated throughout the county additionally the beach width has not
recovered to its 2003 conditions recently the beach width increased 25 ft following hurricanes Ian and Nicole in 2022 through 2024 due to some post storm recovery of of the beach however this is prior to
the passing of hurricane milk another separate study indicates a following hurricane Milton the beach is in a similar state to after the 2022 hurricane season and much of the post storm recovery has eroded again now look at the volume changes
above the 15t navd88 Contour which is the most dynamic part of the beach the largest changes in both Shoreline position and Beach volume happen directly north and south of the inlet the area just south of the inlet in particular shows continuous sand
accumulation or accretion across all periods this is expected because the inlet and its epol are complex and constantly changing features that's why the county has an inlet management plan which helps manage this important resource and balance sand placement
around its vents looking at the countywide data since 1988 there's been a net volume loss of about 35 cubic yards per foot or 6.8 million cubic yards above the5 ft
ne88 Contour from 2003 to 2024 the volume loss increased to 45 cubic yards per foot or 8.7 million cubic yards then from 2016 to 2024 the law screw to 65
cubic yards per foot or 12.7 million cubic yards this shows that erosion has been accelerating since 2016 largely due to extreme weather events and hurricanes like Matthew Irma Ian and
Nicole during the 1988 2003 and 2016 comparison periods we saw significant erosion between the mean high water line and the negative 15 ft nabd 88 cont this is likely due to some aerial erosion erosion from the dry Beach and the
movement of sand from the Nearshore to Offshore during major storms however between the 2022 and 2024 surveys the county experienced a small net gain of 10 cubic yards per foot or about 2 million cubic yards this suggests some
recovery after the 2022 hurricane season but even with this recovery it's not enough to offset the Decades of erosion and above the 15t navd88 Contour the beach is still in a highly eroded State additionally in this next slide we've
pulled in the post Milton results which show that on average what sand was recovered following hurricanes Ian and the Cole has eroded again following hurricane milon in addition to the beach width and volume results shown on the previous two slides our study team
investigated all the beach performance metrics discussed earlier we simplified their Trends on both a countywide and Community scale we invite you to chat about them following this presentation at the specified breakout station at the station focusing on these
Beach Trends there are plots depicting the beach metrics over time at each monument in the study area maybe you'll be able to connect your observations at your local Beach to the data Within These figures we had over 12,000 people respond to our online Beach user survey
thank you for sharing this with your friends your neighbors and your community ultimately the community's engagement is critical on this project being a success because in addition to finding solutions that work for our Coastline each solution has to work for our differing communities across our
Shores ficia County conducted a beach user survey from December 11th to January 12th to assess how residents and visitors use the County's beaches and their perceptions of the beach quality in total over 12,000 Beach users responded to the survey with
approximately 1,000 businesses and 300 valuchi County visitors the vast majority of those Who provided feedback were full-time valua County residents of which approximately 30% of those surveyed lived within the walking distance of the beach and nearly
60% living within a 30-minute Drive the survey results revealed some interesting Trends over half of the respondents visited the beach every week and another 25% visiting monthly more than 75% of the people go to the beach alone or with just one other person when
it comes to access most people get to the beach using vehicular ramps followed by walkovers as for the most popular Beach areas Daytona Beach Daytona Beach Shores and new smyna beach were the top choices not surprisingly the most popular beach activities are physical Recreation
followed by relaxation and then swimming when asked about the quality of the beaches in beluchi County compared to before hurricanes Ian and Nicole 46% of respondents said the beaches are in worse condition while 39% felt that they were about the same the biggest concerns
for the future of alucha County beaches are increased erosion and loss of sand followed by reduced habitat for sea turtles and marine life notably 90% of the respondents are worried that future weather events will further damage the beaches and 91% of that the quality of
the beaches plays a major role in tourism and the local economy overall it's clear that the majority of respondents care deeply about our beaches and their impact on our community next we are moving into the risk assessment and some of the
preliminary results the risk assessment looks at the Beach's Shoreline position and how it impacts nearby infrastructure analyzing it on a partial by partial basis to determine the overall risk for the community the team used three main parameters for
this assessment first shine encroachment which measures the horizontal distance between the mean high water line and Upland infrastructure second the elevation buffer which is the vertical distance between the ocean and the infrastructure and third the erosion
rate which considers the historical Coastal Trends specific to each Community Based on the beach monitoring reports we discussed earlier this Al the team will also consider other factors such as whether a parcel has Coastal armoring or what important resources are
located near the beach all of these parameters will be combined and waited to create a risk index for each Community looking at some early data we found that on average the mean high water position is about 200 ft
seword of Upland infrastructure this distance can vary ranging from as little as 40 ft to as much as a th feet we also used the post hurricane Milton survey data to determine the general elevation of the Upland infrastructure which helps
us understand the vulnerability of each community on average the elevation of Upland infrastructure is about 16 ft navd88 with a range from 4T navd88 to 30 ft navd88 our team is currently
analyzing the historic erosion rates by looking at the shoreline position over time we'll combine all these factors into a single Risk Index in upcoming workshops this spring will dive deeper into the results of this assessment we have all of this great
data what is next the team will evaluate 10 different Beach management options to see how practical they are for each community in the town some of the options we'll consider include things like no action Beach nourishment break Waters seaw
walls and Nearshore artificial reefs among others we'll create a matrix to compare these Solutions and how they might work for each community's Coastline based on the existing conditions and the vulnerability of each area tailor engineering will offer recommendations on which Solutions
should be prioritized taking into account historic Beach Trends and the results of our risk analysis we'll share the recommended solutions for each community at the next round of public workshops where we'll gather your feedback following the next round of public
workshops our four major study components on the left will be combined and diluted into a feasibility assessment the final feasibility report will identify the most vulnerable communities and which Shoreline management strategies are most applicable to each Community Based on the physical characteristics of that
beach and that community's feedback the county will then work with our partners at a community level Municipal level and within the state to implement the recommended Management Solutions ensuring in a resilient Coastline for generations to come to summarize the next steps and
timeline for this feasibility assessment we're currently in Winter of 2025 and this is our first round of public Outreach meetings soon Taylor engineering will submit the preliminary risk results to the county along with a draft report on the economic impact of
Belia County's beaches next we'll hold a second round of public meetings to present the draft feasibility assessment which will include the community risk results and recommended Beach management strategies specific to each Community this will be another opportunity to
gather additional feedback from the community on what the community wants their Beach to look like finally in Fall of 2025 we'll provide the County council with a draft report that includes the recommended Beach management strategies for each Community incorporating all the
public feedback we've received for those of you here with us we welcome you to visit our breakout stations we've set up throughout the venue these stations are related to our ongoing Beach and storm recovery projects review of our historic Beach Trends discussion on potential Shoreline
management options and then feedback and next steps we also have a table set up for various County Beach Services we have a representative from Beach safety Environmental Management and Park belua thank you for joining us this evening or watching online we encourage
you to go and talk to the breakouts stations and ask questions we encourage you if you're watching online to look at more information on the subsequent lats we need our community's engagement if you see a beach survey please forward it to your friends your neighbors and your
community each community in Valia County needs to have a voice on what they want their beaches to look like if you're in person please do not forget to take a handout and we look forward to sharing more results with you soon thank you