SCCWRP-facilitated design charrette helps create priorities for estuary restoration

SCCWRP has submitted to the California State Coastal Conservancy a report outlining how the design charrette process
can be used to develop restoration goals and priorities for small coastal estuaries common to Southern California.

The report sums up the outcomes of a two-day, SCCWRP-facilitated design charrette workshop in December aimed at helping local project proponents and the Coastal Conservancy establish priorities and goals for an upcoming restoration of the Aliso Creek Estuary in Orange County.

A design charrette encourages participants to approach a challenge from a relatively unconstrained perspective.

Coastal managers are interested in improving restoration planning practices for small estuaries because these systems have historically not been studied in much detail, despite their prevalence across the region and the state.

The Southern California Wetlands Recovery Project, which used the Aliso Creek workshop to test-drive the design charrette approach for the first time with small coastal systems, intends to replicate the approach for planning other small estuary restoration projects.

The Aliso Creek Estuary project is an effort to restore a fully functional estuary at the mouth of Aliso Creek in southern Orange County.