Recommendations for coastal planning and beach management in Caribbean insular states during and after the COVID-19 pandemic

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has implications for coastal planning and management. Rules for isolation and physical distancing, among other measures for human life protection, have led to the closure of most beaches around the world. The present critical situation has raised the following question: How can some recommendations be designed in sun, sea, and sand tourism-dependent-insular countries to face "the COVID-19 new normality?" We used the content analysis technique to analyze representative publications on a global level to ascertain information on best management practices. A survey of 58 experts provided additional information. We used inferential statistics for sample selection and produced a list of 43 practices and beach planning and management actions to face the COVID-19 pandemic. This led to 27 new recommendations designed for beach planning and management within insular contexts, some of which were tested in the Republic of Cuba. Recommendations aim to guarantee a culture of safety and improvement within the field of beach or coastal planning and management. These recommendations should prove useful for other insular countries, during the COVID-19 period, in the new normality that follows, and in other post-pandemic scenarios.

Coastal Migration Index for Coastal Flooding Events Increased by Sea Level Rise due to Climate Change: Mexico and Cuba Case Studies

“…In the case of Cuba, the coastal area of the municipality of Guama in the province of Santiago de Cuba was considered using the current administrative political divisions. For Cuba, the information came from the studies of hazards, vulnerabilities, and risks by coastal floods [20,23,52,53], as well as data published by the National Statistics and Information Office in recent years [16,17].…”

“…To weigh different levels of vulnerabilities (structural, ecological, social, economic, functional, non-structural) in the coastal area being analyzed [18,19]. Cuba's archipelago includes the island of Cuba, the Isla de la Juventud, and more than 4194 smaller islands and cays with a total area of 109,884 km 2 [16,17]. The archipelago of Cuba is between 19 • 49 36 and 23 • 17 09 N and between the 74 • 07 52 and 84 • 57 10 W meridians, which includes the Cuban Island and islands adjacent to its coasts.…”

“…The Republic of Cuba is an insular country consisting of an archipelago of varioussized islands that contribute to an extensive coastal zone [11][12][13][14][15]. Coastal flooding took place in 117 different locations in Cuba, 35 of them in the southeastern region [16][17][18], during the 1791-2018 period due to sea level rise, the impact of energetic swell waves, cold fronts, and other extreme meteorological events, e.g., hurricanes. Therefore, SLR constitutes an immediate and growing future danger for the Cuban coast, where an increase of 6.77 cm of sea level was reported from 1966 to 2017 [19,20].…”

Caracterización de las tipologías del medio físico construido en frentes de playa: Municipio Guamá (Cuba)

“…Algunos estudios se han focalizado en los procesos de conversión de pequeñas localidades y la configuración de frentes urbano-costeros (Dadon, 2020, Bruno y Sisti, 2001, las consecuencias ambientales económicas, sociales y culturales del crecimiento urbano, los sistemas de gestión, los modos de planificación de la urbanización turística (Pereira, Carvajal, Milanés & Botero, 2019;Pereira, Milanes, Sarda, Cuker & Botero, 2021;Milanés, Pérez, Cabrera & Cuker, 2021;Botero-Saltarén, Arrizabalaga Fal, Milanes-Batista y Vivas-Cortés, 2017) y los efectos de estos factores sobre la sustentabilidad a mediano y largo plazo (Botero, Pereira, Milanés & Pranzini, 2020).…”

New Beach Landscapes to Promote Social Distancing and Coastal Conservation during and after the COVID-19 Pandemic

“…New publications regarding the COVID-19 pandemic and coastal management are currently underway. In these new studies, the topics addressed remain very diverse and cover, for example, the behavior and perception of beachgoers [30,31]; the pandemic and coastal erosion [32]; and management strategies which, again, involve estimates of the maximum number of visitors allowed [3,8]; signaling [33].…”