332 



other than for military, shipping, and industrial uses. That is, if the 

 facilities are available for recreation, sports, or esthetic enjoyment, 

 they will be used and used to great advantage from an economic stand- 

 point as well as a social standpoint. 



If normal circumstances prevail, the Nation's population and gen- 

 eral high standard of living will continue to increase in the coming 

 decades. A moderate estimate projects a doubling of the national 

 population by the turn of the century, with a significant proportion 

 of that growth occurring in urban areas. 



The population will be made up of a large proportion of youth and 

 young persons of working ages, with only a moderate increase in the 

 elderly through the end of the century. Personal income will rise 

 dramatically. Estimates of leisure time vary considerably, but all 

 authorities agree that the work week will shorten, from a conservative 

 estimate of 35 hours a week to as little as 20 hours per week. The 

 National Planning Association has projected that in 1990, 10 percent, 

 and in 2000, 20 percent of the men between the ages of 25 and 54 will 

 be granted 1-year leave every 7 years. 



Urban and particularly suburban growth will expand greatly both 

 to accommodate the growing population and to provide amenities that 

 it increasingly demands: single family dwellings, recreational areas, 

 transportation facilities, industrial development, and so on. These 

 demands will place rapidly increasing burdens on the Nation's re- 

 sources and its environment. These burdens, in turn, will tax the ability 

 of decisionmakers and the Nation's population to cope with the com- 

 plexity and insistence of the problems generated by a post-industrial, 

 urbanized society. 



Information provided by this analysis of national population and 

 economic trends gives only the grossest indication of the activities and 

 expected pressures of population and economic activity on all of the 

 Nation's environment. Analysis of these indicators can only provide 

 a general indication of the magnitude of the demands which will be 

 generated by these forces in the near future on the estuarine zone. 



Section 3 : Pollution : The Impact of Human Society on the 

 Estuarine Environment 



Man has always used the biophysical environment as he needed it for 

 survival and thrown back into it his waste products and anything else 

 he did not need. As long as civilization was limited to small towns and 

 villages the impact of such treatment on the estuarine environment 

 was not noticeable and apparently insignificant with the development 

 of a civilization based on a complex socioeconomic environment, how- 

 ever, his impact on the natural environment has increased until now 

 the most accurate term to express the relationship of man to his bio- 

 physical environment is "pollution." 



"Pollution" is the degradation of the biophysical environment by 

 man's activities ; it is no longer limited to the discharge of sewage and 

 industrial wastes, but now includes direct or indirect damage to the 

 environment by physical, chemical, or biological modification. 



Environmental degradation is the result of often minute changes in 

 water quality, water circulation, or other conditions which are part of 

 the biophysical estuarine environment. There are brightly colored or 



