Coastal Transportation Vulnerability & Planning Study
This project, the Coastal Transportation Vulnerability & Planning Study, will evaluate state transportation infrastructure across Washington’s 15 coastal counties for vulnerability to coastal hazards including sea level rise, flooding, erosion, and landslides. The project will also identify up to six future nature-based resilience projects to address risks to roadways, improve community resilience, and protect and restore habitat conditions.
Background
Washington’s coastal shorelines span 3,300 miles and 15 counties. Our shorelines provide many services and benefits for both our environment as well as our everyday lives. Coastal shorelines protect nearby lands from floods, improve and maintain water quality, and foster critical habitats for many species like salmon. Our coastal areas and shorelines are also home to many communities, commercial businesses, transportation infrastructure, productive agricultural lands, culturally significant sites and recreational opportunities.
Our coastal communities, infrastructure, and ecosystems are vulnerable to the impacts of a changing climate. With sea levels rising and rainfall patterns shifting due to climate change, coastal flooding, landslides and bluff erosion are getting worse, disrupting the natural processes that sustain Washington’s coastal shorelines.
Coastal roadways are lifelines and crucial connectors for communities, businesses, and tourism in Washington. Often, they are also located within or next to critical coastal zones and estuaries that are vulnerable to sea level rise and other coastal hazards. Coastal highways and infrastructure need to accommodate the dynamic nature of coastal landscapes, diverse community needs, and climate change.
Collaborative Partnership & Funding
Safeguarding Washington’s coastal landscapes requires collaborative approaches and partnerships. This project is an innovative partnership between the Washington departments of Ecology, Transportation, Fish and Wildlife, and Washington Sea Grant. This project is funded by a grant from the National Coastal Resilience Fund, a partnership between the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation.
Erosion threatens State Route 101 along Hood Canal
WSDOT site visit with project partners for a nature-based resilience project on Graveyard Spit
Purpose & Goals of the Project
The purpose of this planning project is to identify state transportation assets within Washington’s 15 coastal counties that are most vulnerable to coastal hazards and then collaboratively identify priority areas for potential future resilience projects. These projects would restore important coastal processes and functions, build climate resilience, support habitat restoration, and address hazard threats to transportation infrastructure.
Nature-based risk reduction projects selected from this project will be based on the results from the vulnerability study, restoration priority lists, Tribal priorities and input, community input, and public data sets to find well-rounded solutions that reduce risks and offer multiple benefits.
Key steps and milestones for the project include:
- Use new and updated data, including local sea level rise projections, to identify at-risk transportation infrastructure across Washington’s 15 coastal counties in a vulnerability assessment.
- With input from Tribes, organizations, and experts, the project team will conduct further evaluation and preliminary scoping of alternatives.
- The project team will identify conceptual nature-based solution project ideas that will proactively and collaboratively address identified risks and create benefits for communities and adjacent habitats.
- The project team will organize engagement sessions and continue to seek input from potentially affected Tribes, communities, and others on the design ideas for nature-based projects at the identified locations.
- Following the conclusion of this project, the Coastal Transportation Vulnerability Study can be used as a basis for seeking future funding to complete these identified nature-based risk reduction projects.
Approximate Timeline
The following is an approximate timeline for this project and is subject to change.
| Spring to Fall 2025 | Fall to Winter 2025 | Winter to Spring 2026 |
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Project Documents & Links
- Project fact sheet
- Additional documents and deliverables will be posted as they are developed.
Related Resources & Data Sets:
- 2011 WSDOT Climate Impacts Vulnerability Assessment
- WSDOT Chronic Environmental Deficiencies (CEDs) Program
- Strategies for Nearshore Protection and Restoration in Puget Sound
- Projected Sea Level Rise for Washington State – A 2018 Assessment
- The Coastal Transportation Vulnerability Study project was inspired in part by Ecology and WSDOT’s partnership on the Graveyard Spit Restoration & Resilience Project
Contact information
Click here to sign up for WSDOT’s mailing list to receive project updates.
Questions? Please reach out to our project team. The points of contact for each agency are listed below.
Washington State Department of Transportation
Project lead, responsible for protecting transportation infrastructure, reviewing technical work and coordinated interagency evaluations
• Jason Koreski, Senior Technical Program Specialist, jason.koreski@wsdot.wa.gov
Washington State Department of Ecology
Funding recipient, project team coordination, Tribal engagement lead, and advisor on nature-based coastal engineering
• Sam Giannakos, Coastal Engineer, Samuel.Giannakos@ecy.wa.gov
Washington Sea Grant
Project technical advisor, sea level rise expert, responsible for community outreach and engagement coordination
• Sydney Fishman, Coastal Management Specialist, sfishma@uw.edu
Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife
Project technical advisor for nearshore ecosystem processes and restoration priorities
• Jason Alberich, Jason.Alberich@dfw.wa.gov