Coastal Communities Working Group – Wisconsin Initiative on Climate Change Impacts

Few local officials and public servants in Great Lakes coastal communities fully appreciate the potential consequences changing lake levels, flood patterns, and storm events that may result from a changing climate. In part, this is because regional climate and lake level projections are provided via abstract data and charts that do not indicate specific consequences for city planners and other resource managers.

Coastal communities need interpretive tools that synthesize dispersed data and translate the predictions of regional climate change models and lake level forecasts into user-friendly, local terms that anyone can understand. Such tools will help decision-makers see the connections between climate model results and the day-to-day decisions they must make.