How can the development of a coastal landscape be viewed?
within a systems framework
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What is a system
a set of interrelated objects compromising components (stores) and processes (links) that are connected together to form a working unit or unified whole
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What do coastal landscape systems do?
store and transfer energy and material on timescales that can vary from a few days to a millennia (thousands of years).
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What energy is available to a coastal landscape system?
kinetic, potential or thermal.
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What does the energy available do?
enables work to be carried out by the natural, geomorphic process that shape the landscape
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What material is predominantly found on beaches?
predominantly the sediment found on beaches, in estuaries and in the relatively shallow waters of the nearshore zone.
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What is a geomorphic process?
formation and shaping of landforms and landscapes by natural processes
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What is the nearshore zone?
area of coastal environment between mean high tide and mean low tide
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What are coastal landscapes recognised as being?
open systems
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What does open system mean?
means energy and matter can be transferred from neighboring systems as an input. It can also be transferred to neighboring systems as an output.
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What is a good example of an open system?
the input of fluvial sediment from a river, as it deposits its load at the mouth when available energy decreases.
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What systems does a coastal landscape have?
inputs, outputs, throughputs.
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What is an input?
including kinetic energy from wind and waves, thermal energy from the heat of the sun and potential energy from the position of material on slopes, material from deposition.
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What is an output
Including marine and wind erosion, from beaches and rock surfaces; evaporation
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What is a throughput
consist of stones, including the beach and nearshore sediment accumulations, and flows (transfers) such as the movement of sediment along a beach by nearshore drift.
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what is longshore drift
movement of sediment by waves and currents along the coastline
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What happens when a systems inputs and outputs are equal?
a state of equilibrium exists within it.
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With a coastal landscape, how could this happen?
at a rate at which sediment is being removed from the beach, the beach will therefore remain the same size
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What happens when equilibrium is disturbed?
the system undergoes self-regulation and changes its form in order to restore equilibrium.
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What is it called when it undergoes self-regulation?
dynamic equilibrium, as the system produces its own response, to the disturbance - This is negative feedback
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What is a sediment cell?
a stretch of coastline and its associated nearshore area within which the movement of coarse sediment, sand and shingle is largely self contained.
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What type of system is a sediment cell generally regarded as?
a closed system, which suggests that no sediment is transferred from one cell to another.
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How many large sediment cells are there around England and Wales?
eleven large sediment cells
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How are the boundaries of sediment cells determined?
topography and shape of the coastline. Large physical features, such as Lands End, act as huge natural barriers that prevent the transfer of sediment to adjacent cells.
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Is it likely that they are completely closed?
No as variations in wind direction, and the presence of tidal currents it is inevitable that some sediment is transferred between neighboring cells, there are also many sub-cells of a smaller scale existing within the major cells.
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Other cards in this set
Card 2
Front
What is a system
Back
a set of interrelated objects compromising components (stores) and processes (links) that are connected together to form a working unit or unified whole
Card 3
Front
What do coastal landscape systems do?
Back
Card 4
Front
What energy is available to a coastal landscape system?
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