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It’s time to put all the options on the table when it comes to discussing climate change adaptation. Managed retreat — the purposeful movement of people, buildings and other assets from areas vulnerable to hazards — has often been considered a last resort. But experts say it can be a powerful tool for expanding the range of possible solutions to cope with rising sea levels, flooding and other climate change effects when used proactively or in combination with other measures.
Managed retreat can expand solutions to climate change.
University of Delaware disaster researcher A.R. Siders said it’s time to put all the options on the table when it comes to discussing climate change adaptation.
Managed retreat — the purposeful movement of people, buildings and other assets from areas vulnerable to hazards — has often been considered a last resort. But Siders said it can be a powerful tool for expanding the range of possible solutions to cope with rising sea levels, flooding and other climate change effects when used proactively or in combination with other measures.
Siders, a core faculty member in UD’s Disaster Research Center, and Katharine J. Mach, associate professor at the University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science, provide a prospective roadmap for reconceptualizing the future using managed retreat in a new paper published online in Science.
“Climate change is affecting people all over the world, and everyone is trying to figure out what to do about it. One potential strategy, moving away from hazards, could be very effective, but it often gets overlooked,” said Siders, assistant professor in the Joseph R. Biden, Jr. School of Public Policy and Administration and the Department of Geography and Spatial Sciences. “We are looking at the different ways society can dream bigger when planning for climate change and how community values and priorities play a role in that.”
Retreat Does Not Mean Defeat
Managed retreat has been happening for decades all over the United States at a very small scale with state and/or federal support. Siders pointed to Hurricanes Harvey and Florence as weather events that caused homeowners near the Gulf of Mexico to seek government support for relocation. Locally, towns such as Bowers Beach, near the Delaware coast, have used buyouts to remove homes and families from flood-prone areas, an idea that Southbridge in Wilmington is also exploring.
People often oppose the idea of leaving their homes, but Siders said thinking seriously about managed retreat sooner and in context with other available tools can reinforce decisions by prompting difficult conversations. Even if communities decide to stay in place, identifying the things community members value can help them decide what they want to maintain and what they purposely want to change.
“If the only tools you think about are beach nourishment and building walls, you’re limiting what you can do, but if you start adding in the whole toolkit and combining the options in different ways, you can
