Understanding Climate Change Adaptation and Gentrification through the Framework of Uneven Coastal Development in Keansburg, New Jersey
type: CreativeWork
description: This study examines the rapid acceleration of coastal development in the United States despite projections of climate change-induced sea level rise. Like no other developed country, the U.S. has transformed its fragile coastline into sites for leisure, consumption, and retirement. These spaces now face the prospect of more frequent and severe storms, as well as land loss and inundation, due to climate change. This dilemma has sparked debates around coastal resilience, adaptation, retreat, and climate gentrification. While many studies seek to measure perceptions of climate change risk and vulnerability, this dissertation reverses the question by positioning risk perceptions as an outcome of political and economic struggles and projects, which are the object of this research. I trace these struggles through the actions of New Jersey’s beach lobby, the U.S.’s oldest and most successful lobby for enrolling the federal and state governments into nurturing coastal development. New Jersey beach lobbyists shepherded the development of coastal engineering as a modern scientific field as one euphemistically directed at ‘shore protection’ of coastal property values, rather than coastal ecosystems themselves. Subsequently, these lobbyists worked to enshrine shore protection in the mandate of the federal government, via the Army Corps of Engineers, and allied with insurers to fashion a solution to rising disaster costs in the form of the National Flood Insurance Program, which uses public funds to underwrite coastal property values. Yet not all U.S. coasts become beaches. Just as the waterfront has frequently been targeted for resort and leisure development, it has also frequently been earmarked as a literal dumping ground dirty and undesirable land-uses like waste dumps, chemical plants, and shipping facilities. This study examines New Jersey’s Bayshore, along the north shore of Monmouth County, as an example of a place with a dynamic and evolving role within the uneven coasta…
abstract: This study examines the rapid acceleration of coastal development in the United States despite projections of climate change-induced sea level rise. Like no other developed country, the U.S. has transformed its fragile coastline into sites for leisure, consumption, and retirement. These spaces now face the prospect of more frequent and severe storms, as well as land loss and inundation, due to climate change. This dilemma has sparked debates around coastal resilience, adaptation, retreat, and climate gentrification. While many studies seek to measure perceptions of climate change risk and vulnerability, this dissertation reverses the question by positioning risk perceptions as an outcome of political and economic struggles and projects, which are the object of this research. I trace these struggles through the actions of New Jersey’s beach lobby, the U.S.’s oldest and most successful lobby for enrolling the federal and state governments into nurturing coastal development. New Jersey beach lobbyists shepherded the development of coastal engineering as a modern scientific field as one euphemistically directed at ‘shore protection’ of coastal property values, rather than coastal ecosystems themselves. Subsequently, these lobbyists worked to enshrine shore protection in the mandate of the federal government, via the Army Corps of Engineers, and allied with insurers to fashion a solution to rising disaster costs in the form of the National Flood Insurance Program, which uses public funds to underwrite coastal property values. Yet not all U.S. coasts become beaches. Just as the waterfront has frequently been targeted for resort and leisure development, it has also frequently been earmarked as a literal dumping ground dirty and undesirable land-uses like waste dumps, chemical plants, and shipping facilities. This study examines New Jersey’s Bayshore, along the north shore of Monmouth County, as an example of a place with a dynamic and evolving role within the uneven coasta…
author: Paganini, Zachary
keywords: Environmental Engineering, Environmental Law, Human Geography, Nature and Society Relations, Spatial Science, Tourism, Urban, Community and Regional Planning, Urban Studies and Planning, Urban geography, adaptation, climate change, retreat, gentrification
date published: 2024-09-01T07:00:00Z
date modified: 2026-07-24T02:00:13Z
provider: City University of New York - Graduate Center
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: The Graduate School and University Center of The City University of New York