On the steps leading to and from East Campus Beach is a cradle and a sign giving beachgoers a simple prompt to take a photo that can assist researchers with tracking changing coastlines.
It’s the first installation in Santa Barbara County of the CoastSnap project, a monitoring device that allows researchers to track changing coastlines thanks to help from citizens walking by, scanning a QR code, and submitting their picture to the CoastSnap app or website.
“We can see the sand build up over the course of the year and see how quickly erosion can happen,” said Kyle Emery, a UC Santa Barbara researcher who’s been overseeing the installation of the cradle.
“Once you get multiple years of data to see how these things actually change directionally, if the beach is getting narrower over time we’ll be able to see that in these images,” Emery said.
Emery is an assistant researcher at UC Santa Barbara’s marine science institute. His research primarily focuses on coastal ecosystems and how climate change impacts those ecosystems.
CoastSnap was developed by researchers in Australia in 2017 to get the beach communities involved in gathering data about changing coastlines. Citizens can place their phone in the cradle so that every image uploaded is taken from the same height and angle.
The main thing that the images will be used for is creating a time series to allow researchers to see how the beach width changes over time. Emery said they’re also interested in tracking kelp that washes up onto the beach. Kelp serves as food and sometimes habitat for flies, beetles and birds.
The cradle has been at the steps for a year, but its accompanying signage was just recently added. Even without the sign, Emery said they received 130 photos in the past year.
“That’s our primary goal, just being able to provide some information and engagement to people in the local communities with aspects of the coast that they might not necessarily think about on a normal day-to-day,” Emery said.
Researchers will also be able to use the images to look at how the cliffs at East Campus Beach change over time. They’ll be able to look at the position of cliff bases, which are reflective of overall bluff erosion.
The ability to monitor cliff erosion along Lagoon Road where the university has housing and academic buildings will allow for the university to make long-term plans for those buildings.
“It can tell the story of how fast it’s going, and it can help us to define triggers,” said Shari Hammond, associate director of campus planning and design. “Triggers on when we need to take some kind of an action to relocate Lagoon Road or the utilities within it or even further in campus to relocate buildings.”
Hammond said the university physically monitors the bluffs along Lagoon Road each year for planning. Right now there are no immediate plans to move back pathways or facilities. Hammond said they have written a sea level rise plan that has yet to be approved by the California Coastal Commission but has been internally reviewed by the commission.
“It’s a really great project, and it definitely is complementary to the campus administrative side to manage and study bluff erosion,” Hammond said.
The data collected from images taken at the cradle will be compared to data gathered from satellite imagery, which is part of a larger project funded by the California Ocean Protection Unit. The goal of that project is to figure out how to measure different habitats and features on the beach, Emery said.
“It’s really great for us because it’s a data source, but it’s really great for the community to utilize these things and learn about their local ecosystem,” Emery said. “It has benefits to both the researchers and the community. It’s a nice blend of those two things; that’s not something that you see as often in the research world.”
Emery said they’re in the process of getting another cradle approved to add to the staircase at the end of Camino Majorca in Isla Vista to study the beach on the other side of Isla Vista’s shore.
