Coastal Harmony

Sector: Construction / Land Development / Infrastructure Development / Environmental Engineering / Coastal Planning

The Opportunity

A major developer is planning a luxury marina community — waterfront homes, private docks, and vibrant public spaces — nestled along a pristine coastal dune aquifer system. The location is ideal for high-end living, but also ecologically sensitive: wetlands, groundwater-dependent dune ecosystems, and shallow aquifers sustained by complex recharge dynamics.

The challenge isn’t whether to build — it’s how to build responsibly.

The developer is committed to low-impact development, but needs a way to ensure that “low impact” isn’t just a slogan — it must be scientifically defensible, regulator-reviewed, and ecologically sound.

The MAGNET Approach

MAGNET4WATER is being used to guide the entire planning and design process — enabling development and ecosystems to coexist through data-driven design.

MAGNET supports a sophisticated, multiscale modeling architecture that spans from regional aquifer systems to nested, site-specific groundwater dynamics. This allows planners and engineers to simulate interactions across scales — from dune wetland recharge to trench dewatering — with precision and clarity.

The team is leveraging MAGNET’s ability to maximize all available data, including:

• Global big data layers: topography, land use, climate, hydrogeology, streams, lakes, and surface water networks
• Statewide water wells database: including well logs, screened intervals, and historical static water levels
• Locally collected site data: borehole logs, monitoring wells, and aquifer test results
• Aquifer testing and calibration: MAGNET’s groundwater models are calibrated directly to aquifer test monitoring data

MAGNET enables the team to evaluate the project from every angle:

• Big picture: regional aquifer dynamics, recharge zones, and ecosystem connectivity
• Local scale: site-specific flow paths, receptor exposure, and construction impacts
• Long-term impacts: potential hydrologic shifts and dune wetland degradation
• Short-term effects: transient dewatering and temporary flow disruption

This multiscale, data-rich approach transforms the planning process from speculative to simulation-driven — empowering smarter, faster, and more resilient decisions.

From Understanding to Innovation

Instead of spending months wrangling data, stitching together disconnected models, and manually recalibrating simulations, MAGNET allows the team to focus on what matters:

• Understanding the system
• Analyzing impacts
• Refining designs
• Exploring alternatives
• Aligning technical teams

Eliminating Long-Term Impact

MAGNET’s calibrated groundwater models indicate that the original marina design would likely cause long-term hydrologic disruption to nearby dune wetlands and aquifer systems.

The solution isn’t to abandon the project — it’s to engineer protection.

MAGNET’s nested modeling suggests that installing a clay liner beneath the marina basin could effectively eliminate long-term aquifer impacts by preventing vertical leakage and preserving natural flow gradients.

This recommendation is:

• Science-based
• Cost-effective
• Technically sound
• Delivered by the developer to EGLE for review and consideration

Bringing Short-Term Impact Within Natural and Regulatory Limits

With long-term risks addressed, attention turns to transient construction impacts — especially those caused by dewatering during excavation.

MAGNET enables:

• Iterative testing and sensitivity analysis of dewatering schemes
• Scenario modeling to streamline dewatering duration and align impacts with seasonal fluctuations and regulatory thresholds

These refinements help ensure that short-term impacts remain predictable, reversible, and compliant — protecting nearby dune ecosystems while enabling efficient construction planning.

Section-Based Dewatering — Precision by Design

To minimize impact further, MAGNET guides the team toward a section-based construction strategy:

• The marina basin is divided into three distinct sections
• Dewatering is planned one section at a time
• Each phase is modeled, visualized, and optimized using MAGNET’s real-time simulation tools

This approach:

• Reduces total dewatering volume
• Shortens exposure time for each zone
• Enables adaptive management based on live monitoring and feedback
• Preserves ecological integrity while maintaining construction efficiency

MAGNET Enables Transparent, Defensible, Science-Based Decision-Making

MAGNET doesn’t eliminate disagreement — especially in communities where development is emotionally charged or politically sensitive. But it does provide a foundation that is:

• Transparent — every assumption, input, and outcome is visible and traceable
• Defensible — grounded in calibrated simulation and regulatory logic
• Objective — driven by data, not intuition or politics
• Science-based — integrating real-time modeling, sensitivity analysis, and conservative assumptions

In a landscape where not every stakeholder will be objective — and some may oppose development regardless of safeguards — MAGNET empowers technical teams and regulators to act with clarity, confidence, and integrity.

The Current Status

• A comprehensive model-based assessment delivered to EGLE for review and consideration
• Long-term aquifer impacts addressed through clay liner design
• Short-term construction impacts modeled to remain within natural and regulatory limits
• A replicable framework for sustainable coastal development
• A foundation for informed permitting and stakeholder dialogue

The Bigger Picture

This project demonstrates a powerful truth:

Low-impact development does not mean no development.

With MAGNET, teams can:

• Design with data
• Build with confidence
• Protect what matters
• Accelerate permitting and collaboration
• Deliver value to both ecosystems and investors

MAGNET enables:

• Time spent on understanding the system, not wrangling data