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wetland habitat remaining in the estuarine zone of the United States. 

 Perhaps each acre is not valuable by itself, but the total habitat is 

 irreplaceable. 



Use damage is not a necessary feature of civilization in the estu- 

 arine zone, but use conflicts will continue to exist as more and more 

 demands are made on the natural environment. The ability of any 

 management authority to prevent use damage and to resolve use con- 

 flicts depends not only upon its institutional composition and legal 

 authority, but also upon the social, economic, and biophysical charac- 

 teristics of the estuarine management unit within which its authority 

 is exercised. 



The analyses of social and economic values of the estuarine zone 

 examined concurrently with the similar analyses of use conflicts, pol- 

 lutional effects, and use damages form the basis for resolving use con- 

 flicts through the application of technical knowledge; i.e., technical 

 management. 



The primary objective of technical management is to accommodate 

 the needed and desired uses of any estuarine management unit within 

 that system without overall damage to the biophysical environment. 

 The ability to achieve this objective depends on the boundaries of the 

 management unit and upon the means available for resolving both 

 prohibitive-use conflicts and restrictive-use conflicts. 



The impact of the social and economic requirements of civilization 

 on the natural estuarine environment is the technical problem with 

 which management must deal, and effective control of this impact can 

 be maintained only if both the major sources of damage and the geo- 

 graphic range of their influence are subject to unified control. 



An estuarine management unit, therefore, should consist not only of 

 the estuarine waters, bottoms, and associated marshlands ; but it should 

 also include all of the shoreline surrounding the estuarine waters 

 themselves and as much of the adjoining land as is necessary to reg- 

 ulate the discharge of wastes into estuarine waters. 



Allocation of part of the estuarine resource for an exclusive single- 

 purpose use is a necessary fact of estuarine management. The shore- 

 line is a necessary location for shipping docks and for swimming 

 beaches, but they cannot both occupy the same place on the shoreline. 

 Similarly, frequently dredged channels and oyster beds cannot occupy 

 the same space at the same time. Kesolution of such conflicts can be 

 achieved by allocation of adequate space to each use through whatever 

 institutional mechanism is established. 



The evaluation of the effects of prohibitive uses on the estuarine 

 environment is probably the most difficult problem currently facing 

 technical management. The immediate and obvious effects of the 

 habitat loss associated with such uses can be measured and described 

 fairly easily, but the ultimate results of the modification of water 

 movement patterns and flushing characteristics can only be estimated 

 in general terms. 



In nearly every problem associated with prohibitive-use conflicts, 

 however, the area of primary concern is the effect on the estuarine 

 ecosystem of any physical modifications proposed ; the limitations of 

 knowledge mentioned above, therefore, present a critical problem in 

 present efforts to resolve prohibitive-use conflicts. 



