"Resilient Bay": Sea level rise and changing san francisco baylands

This project is an extension, of sorts, to a data visualization residency that I have been in for the past 4 months at the Exploratorium; A museum in a newly renovated pier in San Francisco that inspires inquiry through hands-on engagement with science, art and human perception. Located at the end of the pier is the Bay Observatory, a second story, glass encased gallery whose views of the Bay and the downtown cityscape, as well as the artworks, instruments, and exhibits reveal unseen systems and processes that shape the Bay Area.

A 3D topographic model of the Bay, called "Visualizing the Bay" is the physical platform for which data layers and visualizations are projected. Visitors can interact with a series culturally and environmentally themed layers developed by Eric Socolofsky 2 years ago. It was suggested to me by the curator of the Bay Observatory, Susan Schwartzenberg to produce a series of visualizations for the table that can give visitors an "ecological context" to the existing layers and future visualizations to come. Sea level rise, land cover change, ecological conservation, restoration, indigenous sovereignty and traditional ecological knowledge within the context of the Bay Area were some of the issues I explored with the incredible resources and people that come through the Observatory.

The Exploratorium has a long history of nurturing relationships with collaborators from both the sciences and the arts in the development of their exhibits and programs. They are forging a new path into collaborating with environmental scientists from a myriad of disciplines. The San Francisco Estuary Institute is an environmental research organization based in Richmond, CA and is a partner of the Exploratorium with whom I have worked with before. Arguably, they are doing the the most robust analyses and developing data of what the historical ecology of the "Baylands" looked like before European settlement. These data are used by many of stakeholders to inform present-day land use planning, adaptive management planning for future climate change and sea level rise impacts. The data are frequently updated and shared online through their EcoAtlas data portal, but most of these datasets are used in publications, reports, and regional management plans.

Google Earth as a collaborative platform

I dove into SFEI's (and other's) datasets exploring the ecological and cultural processes that shape the Bay. I converted available GIS shape and raster files into KML (where possible) and projected them onto the 3D Viz Table through Google Earth. It was a great tool for the exhibit team and I to explore the data on a physical relief map and test different narratives. One theme became clear, the Bay has been and continues to be resilient to dramatic climatic and sea level changes. Most of the action happens along the shoreline! In fact, the Bay is shaped by movement and disturbance and still, the Baylands have sustained incredible levels of biological diversity throughout time. How do I visualize and inspire visitors to engage in what makes the Bay resilient?

“if we are dealing with a system profoundly affected by changes external to it, and continually confronted by the unexpected, the constancy of its behavior becomes less important than the persistence of the relationships…” CS Holling, 1973”

The Project: Tackling sea level rise and ecosystem change
data and methodologies

Most people in the Bay Area are unaware of the forces that shape the Bayland system and perceive sea level rise and climate change as something abstract and in the distant future. By exploring 3 interrelated systems (Geologic, Biological, and Cultural) over a long period of time (18,100 years), what patterns emerge? What is lost? What is gained? Where is there overlap? What does this reveal about the resilience of the San Francisco Bay Estuary and the species that depend on it (including humans!).

1 a) post glacial sea level rise: 18,000 - 2,000 years ago.

During the most recent glacial maximum (approx 18,000 years ago) the shoreline of the SF Bay extended past the Farrallones islands (130 miles west). As glaciers melted, the sea flooded an ancient river valley that will eventually become the San Francisco Bay Estuary.

- I digitized sea level boundaries using Google Earth and GIS to georeference critical post glacial time periods. I relied heavily on the extensive research and early animation done by geologist and educator, Dr. Tanya Atwater of the Educational Multimedia Visualization Center at UC Santa Barbara in 2006 - 2007.

- New Media Developer at the Exploratorium, Eyal Shahar wrote a program to integrate the georeferenced sea level boundaries into an interactive animated sequence. That is, we want visitors to be able to "scrub" through time and experience the sea flooding over the relief map of the San Francisco Bay.

Animation is tested on the Viz Table. Preliminary visitor feedback: "Where is the sea level today?", "Where is my city?", "Are glaciers melting now?" "Will we fly around in rocket ships in the future?" — Animation is tested on the Viz Table. Preliminary visitor feedback: "Where is the sea level today?", "Where is my city?", "Are glaciers melting now?" "Will we fly around in rocket ships in the future?"

b) Sea Level Rise: "Historic" (1850) to "Present Day"

Technical Challenge:
- Going from the very general to very specific (data precision) as we get closer to present day.
- SFEI's Bay Area Aquatic Resources Inventory (BAARI, 2011) has very precise data stored as ArcGIS shapefiles about the historic shoreline and associated bayland habitats. They are inextricably linked and nested!
- Aggregating and clipping for "water" is more complicated than anticipated.
- Cannot export to KML successfully. Eyal's MapMorpher program is based on Java, requires polygons to be continuous shapes with lat/long points to "anchor" the animation sequence from one layer to the next.

Conceptual Point*
- According to geologists, present day sea level is 328 ft ABOVE historic levels! This is also noted in Matthew Booker, Rising Tide, 2013. “Sea levels have reached present heights only once before, and rarely have they high enough to come through the Golden Gate at all”.

5,000 years ago, -8 m (below present day shoreline measured at average high tide)
10,000 years ago, -55 m
15,000 years ago, -I00 m. (Atwater, 1977. Ancient Processes. P. 41).

Present Day shoreline and sea level. SFEI Bay Area Aquatic Resources Inventory database-BAARI (2011).

c) Future Sea Level Rise Scenarios: Present Day to 2100

There are many scenarios and models projecting sea level inundation for the Bay Area. I need to further evaluate these and decide what the user experience will be based on the animated sequence of the post-glacial era to present day.

Conceptual note
- In a preliminary exploration of various sea level models online, water levels in all future scenarios follow the same patterns as sea levels during the post glacial period. Water will go where it remembers.

“All water has a perfect memory and is forever trying to get back to where it was” - Tony Morrison”

2. Bayland Ecosystems

2. a) Historic Wetlands
- Diversity, resilience, expansive, was the basis for human settlement and development of our shared history around the Bay...not to mention the biological diversity these larger processes supported.
- Tidal Marsh, Tidal Flat, Salt Ponds, Deep Bay, Shallow Bay

2. b) Present Day Wetlands
- fragmentation, diminishment, conversion, the story of "us" is not all bad.
- Tidal Marsh, Tidal Flat, Salt Ponds, Diked Baylands, Bay Fill

3) Human Ecosystems

Red outlines are current restoration management sites downloaded from EcoAtlas.org 2015. Black outlines are heavy and light rail (BART), Major freeways are labeled. From Google Earth layers.

- What is the physical manifestation of land conversion and rejuvenation/stewardship activities around the Bay? Not all human activity is "bad"...must consider the long term dynamics and processes at work.

- Transportation (roads, Rail, Airports)
- Levees
- Parks and Bay Trail
- Restoration Sites*

Challenges

- Conceptual challenge of what ecosystems/habitats to represent. If I only represent tidal Marsh/wetland, that would leave out the human component as represented in Diked Bay and Bay Fill and Salt Ponds. At what scale is it most understandable and clear?
-Technical Challenges: Come up with an efficient and effective production process to produce these datasets for the Viz Table AND the fellowship project (still undetermined). IE: GIS Shapefiles to KML, Map Morpher. PNGS projected on the table, or discrete polygons to symbolize and interact with in a web-based platform? GDAL, GeoJSON, TopoJSON solutions?
- Need to identify goals for the fellowship project and intended audiences and resulting user experience.

"Resilient Bay": Sea level rise and changing san francisco baylands

Google Earth as a collaborative platform

The Project: Tackling sea level rise and ecosystem changedata and methodologies

1 a) post glacial sea level rise: 18,000 - 2,000 years ago.

b) Sea Level Rise: "Historic" (1850) to "Present Day"

c) Future Sea Level Rise Scenarios: Present Day to 2100

2. Bayland Ecosystems

The Project: Tackling sea level rise and ecosystem change
data and methodologies