ABSTRACT
Enhancing resilience has become a key element of preparedness for extreme events and climate change. This chapter explores barriers, limits and limitations to resilience through a case study of the Barnegat Bay region of coastal New Jersey, USA. Like many urbanised coastal watersheds, the Barnegat Bay region is already experiencing significant environmental stresses as the result of population growth and residential and commercial development, including loss of wetlands and natural areas, and contamination and eutrophication of the bay from run-off. Stakeholders proposed numerous adaptive strategies for increasing climate resilience in the region, but at the same time identified many limits and limitations associated with these efforts. Recommendations generally fell into three broad categories: engineering measures, policy and land use changes, and economic diversification. The barriers identified by stakeholders can be roughly sorted into several categories including: settlement and economic development barriers; political and cultural barriers; and policy and regulatory barriers.
