The Coastal System

The Coastal System

Inputs:

• Marine: waves, tides
• People: human activities, economics, recreation/tourism, sea defences
• Atmospheric: weather/climate, climate change, colar energy
• Land: rock type/structure, tectonics

Processes:

• Erosion: hydraulic action, abrasion/corrasion, solution
• Transportation: sediment cells, longshore drift
• Deposition
• Weathering/mass movement: freeze thaw, salt weathering, carbonation

Outputs: 

• Erosional landforms: cliffs, stacks, wave cut platforms, headlands
• Depositional landforms: beaches, spits, salt marshes, sand dunes

Coastal sediment cells (aka littoral cells) are lengths of coastline that are pretty much entirely self contained for the movement of sediment. Each one is a costal system, so processes going on in one sediment cell don't affect the movement of sediment in another cell.

Beaches

• Backshore: starts at the cliff and ends at the foreshore
• Foreshore: from the backshore to the nearshore
• Nearshore: from the foreshore to the offshore
• Offshore: from nearshore onwards
• Berms: ridges of pebbles about 1-2m high. They're formed vy waves throwing these materials up onto the beach (often associated with contrstuctive waves)
• Storm beaches: formed by storm waves. they're higher up the beach than the maximum high tide…