Serious beach erosion and wall damage such as this shown at Cliff Walk, Newport, R.I. 

 point to the need for a planned approach to shoreline development. By investigating 

 and determining suitable methods for protecting, restoring and developing the shore- 

 line against wave and current erosion, the recreational and esthetic features of our 

 coasts can be preserved. 



sediments. New chemical substances are created at the rate of 400 to 500 

 annually. Many of them are toxic and will find their way to the ocean; yet 

 full knowledge of their biological effects is lacking and removal methods 

 for them are poorly developed. At the present state of research it is not 

 possible to predict reliably the effects of a given dose of solid waste on the 

 marine environment. Man is still largely ignorant of the long-term and 

 low-level effects of chronic crude oil pollution, such as that released from 

 tankers flushing storage tanks at sea. These effects may be serious and 

 longer lasting. Their dangers are likely to become more critical as transpor- 

 tation of oil, its products and synthetics increases and as petroleum produc- 

 tion shifts increasingly to Continental Shelf sources. 



Physical modifications of the shoreline, while they may be beneficial to 

 man in numerous ways, can also be harmful. They alter the natural environ- 

 ment and sometimes speed up or slow down the effects of erosion. 

 Dredging unsettles bottom sediments, removes bottom dwelling marine 

 life, reduces the water's ability to assimilate oxygen-demanding wastes, 

 blankets fish nests and masks out light required by aquatic plants. The 

 spoils of dredging dumped as land fill increase water turbidity, smother 

 bottom organisms and alter depths, changing the marine habitat. Dam 

 construction creates barriers to upstream breeding migrations of marine 



23 



