Oxford 2100: Adapting to Climatic Changes

Project for LARC642: Graduate Studio III (Fall 2021). University of Maryland, College Park.This project, supported by the National Center for Smarth Growth’s Partnership for Action Learning in Sustainability (PALS), provides the Oxford community with a visual glimpse of their newly-imagined port town in the year 2100. Students responded to projected sea level rise of 3.5 feet as identified by the Town of Oxford and the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) Coastal Planners. In addition to a change in mean sea level, students considered mean higher high water (MHHW) above sea level to explore planning and design-scale interventions to inform Oxford’s strategies on climate-sensitive development. The design of this hypothetical intervention focused on sea level rise, as well related factors such as pluvial hydrology, saltwater intrusion, and storm surge.Maryland Department of Natural Resource