Coastal Dune Morphology Evolution Combining Lidar and UAV Surveys, Truc Vert beach 2011-2019

Abstract

Laporte-Fauret, Q.; Castelle, B.; Marieu, V.; Bujan, S.; Michalet, R., and Rosebery. D., 2020. Coastal dune morphology evolution combining Lidar and UAV surveys, Truc Vert beach 2011-2019. In: Malvarez, G. and Navas, F. (eds.), Global Coastal Issues of 2020. Journal of Coastal Research, Special Issue No. 95, pp. 163–167. Coconut Creek (Florida), ISSN 0749-0208.In the context of climate change, coastal dunes, which provide significant ecosystem services, are one of the most vulnerable coastal environments. Moreover, the lack of high resolution and large spatial scale data limits our understanding of coastal dunes, which are subject to important morphological variations over a wide range of spatial and temporal scales. This study is focused on combining non-intrusive remote sensing methods including a series of historical aerial photographs, airborne Lidar and UAV surveys in order to better understand the coastal dune morphodynamic on a wide range of spatial and temporal scales. On the time scale of decades, aerial photos indicate a reasonably stable coastal dune position, with large anthropogenic reprofiling and vegetation planting resulting in a reasonably alongshore-uniform morphology. On shorter time scales, the combination of Lidar and UAV 4-km surveys between 2011 and 2019 shows a quasi-steady dune volume increase by approximately 64 m3/m, associated with a foredune crest growth and a landward migration reaching 1.1 m and 0.54 m in average, respectively. On the other hand, the dune foot shows a more complex dynamics, dominated by a large landward migration (shoreline erosion) of approximately 20 m during the outstanding winter of 2013/2014 followed by a slow seaward migration (recovery). This study provides new insight into coastal dune morphological changes driven by both Aeolian and marine processes from the time scale of storm to approximately a decade, highlighting the relevance of UAV surveys for such applications.