Gulf Coast Water Port Facilities Study. Appendix A. Western Gulf Hydrobiological Zones.
Abstract
Behind the beach line of the narrow, curvilinear, barrier islands of Texas there are at least a million and a third acres of shallow bays. For a long time these estuaries and lagoons have been receiving steadily increasing waste discharges from the land. With little tidal flux and often small exchange of water with the Gulf of Mexico, the input of rivers and Gulf tides and waste flows are concentrated by evaporation and stirred by steady winds to create new physico-chemical regimes that cause important shifts in the ecosystem. Fortunately, awareness is becoming more general among those who perform major manipulations on the coastal lands of Texas that we have no penetrating conception of how close we are to the point of no return, that is, when the magnificent biomachine that transforms the electromagnetic energy of the sun into a brown shrimp, a blue crab or a red fish comes to a silent halt. The Texas Coastal Zone, which embraces these waterways, includes 1800 miles of bay and Gulf shorelines adjacent to 20,000 square miles of coastal lands some 40 miles in width. Flawn (1972) estimates that products of commercial fisheries retail at $200,000,000 per year, and the fertile soils of the Zone produce agricultural products valued at $500,000,000 per year. The beaches and waters of the Coastal Zone are a recreation resource that attracts large numbers of tourists and sports fishermen. According to Flawn (1972) 3,000,000 tourists spend nearly $200,000,000 per year in the Texas coastal region. About one-quarter of the state's population and one-third of its economic resources are concentrated in a zone that encompasses no more than 6 percent of the state's area (Fisher et al, 1972). (Author)
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Apr 01, 1973
- Accession Number
- ADA091404
Entities
Organizations
- Arthur D. Little