The Gulf of Maine is an international watershed in the North Atlantic stretching north from Provincetown at the tip of Massachusetts Bay in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to Cape Sable on the Bay of Fundy in the province of Nova Scotia in Canada. For over 13,000 years, the Gulf has been developed around access to the coast for fishing, trading, and recreation. Today, these coastal development patterns put the cultural landscapes, economies, communities, and aging infrastructure systems along the Gulf at risk.
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Climate Futures on the Gulf of Maine uses place-based scenario planning to illustrate the risks, vulnerabilities, and plausible futures for ten infrastructure systems along the rim of the Gulf. Place-based scenario planning is a method of long-term strategic planning that creates representations of multiple, plausible futures that are used to inform decision-making in the present. While complementary to probabilistic models used to forecast future vulnerabilities, scenario-based planning shifts emphasis from statistical probability to ways of thinking about the future. The goal of place-based scenario planning is not to predict the most likely outcome, but to reveal biases and blind spots in complex and non-linear situations.
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Climate Futures uses the medium of landscape representation to surface the cultural value systems embedded in existing infrastructural systems, and position landscape as a driver when evaluating design from individual infrastructures to the Gulf of Maine watershed.
Scenario Planning
Chermack, Thomas J. Scenario Planning in Organizations: How to Create, Use, and Assess Scenarios. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., 2011.
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Clingen, Kira, and Office for Urbanization. “Long Beach Is....? Long Beach Could Be...? Place-Based Scenarios for a Cultural Landscape in a Changing Climate.” Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Graduate School of Design, 2024.
Clingen, Kira. “Place Based Scenario Planning: A Design Research Methodology for Climate Adaptation.” In Resilient Urbanism, edited by Gihan Karunaratne, 250–64. New York: Taylor and Francis, 2025.
Haigh, Nardia. Scenario Planning for Climate Change: A Guide for Strategists. London: Routledge, 2019.
Stapleton, Jeremy. Exploratory Scenario Planning: How to Navigate an Uncertain Future. Cambridge, MA: Lincoln Institute of Land Use Policy, 2020.
Waldheim, Charles, and Office for Urbanization. “Compound Vulnerabilities: The Case of Cape Ann.” Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Graduate School of Design, 2022. capeann.officeforurbanization.org.
Waldheim, Charles, and Office for Urbanization. “Regenerative Landscapes: Beyond Conservation to Adaptation.” Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Graduate School of Design, 2024. capeann.officeforurbanization.org/2.
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Infrastructure
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American Society of Engineers. “A Comprehensive Assessment of America’s Infrastructure.” Infrastructure Report Card. New York, N.Y.: American Society of Engineers, 2025.
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Ascher, Kate. The Works: Anatomy of a City. New York: Penguin Random House, 2005.
Belanger, Pierre. Landscape as Infrastructure. New York: Routledge, 2017.
Chachra, Deb. How Infrastructure Works: Inside the Systems That Shape Our World. New York: Riverhead Books, 2023.
Choate, Pat, and Susan Walter. America in Ruins: The Decaying Infrastructure. Washington, D.C.: Council of State Planning Agencies, 1981.
Colgan, Charles S., Damon Yakovleff, and Samuel B Merrill. “An Assessment of the Economics of Natural and Built Infrastructure for Water Resources in Maine.” Portland, ME: University of Southern Maine and New England Environmental Finance Center, 2013.
Edwards, Paul N. “Infrastructure and Modernity: Force, Time, and Social Organization in the History of Sociotechnical Systems.” In Modernity and Technology, edited by Thomas J. Misa, Philip Brey,and Andrew Feenberg. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2002.
Hillhouse, Grady. Engineering in Plain Sight: An Illustrated Field Guide to the Constructed Environment. San Francisco: No Starch Press, 2023.
Hoeferlin, Derek. Way Beyond Bigness: The Need for Watershed Architecture. Singapore: Applied Research and Design, 2023.
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Gulf of Maine Watershed​
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Benoy, Glenn A., Matthew Liebman, Eric A. Luker, Gregory Hellyer, and Marina Schauffler. “Watershed Status: State of the Gulf of Maine Report.” Gulf of Maine Council on the Marine Environment, 2016.
Collette, Bruce B. and Grace Klein-Macphee. Bigelow and Schroeder’s Fishes of the Gulf of Maine. 3rd ed. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Books, 2002.
Conkling, Philip W. From Cape Cod to the Bay of Fundy: An Environmental Atlas of the Gulf of Maine. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1995.
Conkling, Philip. Islands in Time: A Natural and Cultural History of the Islands of the Gulf of Maine. 2nd ed. Portland, ME: Down East Books, 1999.
Environmental Protection Agency. “How’s My Waterway?” Environmental Protection Agency. www.epa.gov/waterdata/hows-my-waterway.
Georges, Gigi. Downeast: Five Maine Girls and the Unseen Story of Rural America. New York: Harper, 2021.
Gulf of Maine Council on the Marine Environment. “Gulf of Maine Council on the Marine Environment,” 2025. www.gmri.org.
Gulf of Maine Research Institute. “Annual Warming Update 2024,” 2024. www.gmri.org/stories/2024-gulf-of-maine-warming-update.
Hay, John, and Peter Farb. The Atlantic Shore: Human and Natural History from Long Island to Labrador. New York: Harper and Row, 1966.
Island Institute. “Island Institute,” 2025. www.islandinstitute.org.
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Kelly, Richard D. “Gulf of Maine Watershed.” Augusta, ME: Maine State Planning Office,1991. www.collections.leventhalmap.org/search/commonwealth:bk12dn70k.
Massachusetts Department of Public Health. “Interactive Beach Water Quality Dashboard.” Massachusetts Office of Energy and Environment. www. mass.gov/info-details/interactive-beachwater-quality-dashboard.
Platt, David D., ed. Rim of the Gulf: Restoring Estuaries in the Gulf of Maine. Rockland, ME: Island Institute, 1998.
Gulf of Maine Council on the Marine Environment, and Megan C. Tyrell. “Gulf of Maine Marine Habitat Primer.” Boston, MA: Gulf of Maine Council on the Marine Environment, 2005.
Van Dusen, Katrina, and Anne C. Johnson Hayden. “The Gulf of Maine: Sustaining Our Common Heritage.” Augusta: Maine State Planning Office, November 1989. digitalmaine.com/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1000&context=gulf_of_maine_council_docs.
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Coastal Climate Change Adaptation​
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Berger, Alan M., Carolyn Kousky, and Billy Fleming. A Blueprint for Coastal Adaptation: Uniting Design, Economics, and Policy. Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 2020.
Brears, Robert. Blue and Green Cities: The Role of Blue-Green Infrastructure in Managing Urban Water Resources. 2nd ed. New York: Springer Nature, 2023.
Conrad, Pamela, and Kotchakorn Voraakhom. “WORKS with Nature: Low Carbon Adaptation Techniques for a Changing World.” Washington, D.C.: American Society of Landscape Architects, 2024. https://climatepositivedesign.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/241205_WorksWithNature.pdf.
Elkin, Rosetta. Landscapes of Retreat. Berlin: Keller-Verlag, 2023.
Georgetown Climate Center. Adaptation Clearinghouse. Georgetown Climate Center. www.adaptationclearinghouse.org.
Sasaki. “Designing with Water: Creative Solutions from Around the Globe.” Preparing for the Rising Tide Series 2. August 2014.
Schottland, Taj, Melissa G. Merriam, Christopher Hilke, Kristen Grubbs, and Wayne Castonguay. “Great Marsh Coastal Adaptation Plan.” Montpelier, VT: National Wildlife Federation Northeast Regional Office, 2017.
Woods Hole Group. Living Shorelines in New England: State of the Practice. Boston, MA: Woods Hole Group, 2017.
Woods Hole Sea Grant. Homeowners Handbook to Prepare for Coastal Hazards. Woods Hole, MA: Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, 2020.
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Gulf of Maine Ecosystems​
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Carlozzi, Carl, Kathryn King, William F. Newbold, Jr. Ecosystems and Resources of the Massachusetts Coast. Boston, MA: Office of Coastal Zone Management, 1975.
Conforti, Joseph A. Imagining New England. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2001.
Cronon, William. Changes in the Land: Indians, Colonists, and the Ecology of New England. New York: Hill and Wang, 1983.
Gawler, Susan, and Andrew Cutko. Natural Landscapes of Maine: A Guide to Natural Communities and Ecosystem. Augusta: Maine Department of Conservation, 2018.
Leahy, Christopher, John Hanson Mitchell, and Thomas Conuel. The Nature of Massachusetts. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, Inc., 1996.
Reidel, Carl H., ed. New England Prospects: Critical Choices in a Time of Change. Hanover, NH: University Press of New England, 1982.
Stilgoe, John. Alongshore. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004.
Swain, P.C. Classification of the Natural Communities of Massachusetts. Westborough, MA: Natural Heritage & Endangered Species Program, Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife, 2020.
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