Apartment residents are important stakeholders in managed dyke realignment around the Bay of Fundy: landscape benefits, preferences, and complementarity

Apartment residents can be overlooked as stakeholders of rural land-use decisions. However, we need to understand the needs and perspectives of apartment dwellers, especially on increasingly crowded coasts. Climate change is leading to a reimagination of rural coastlines worldwide, including in dyked agricultural land. This prompts local discussions about where to continue to defend such land uses through higher dykes, where to retreat the line of defense landward, and where to remove dykes entirely. We report on an exploratory survey of rural apartment residents around the hypertidal Bay of Fundy to understand if and how these residents benefit from linear dykes, drained dykelands and tidal wetlands, and how those benefits influence their adaptation preferences. Apartment residents report many benefits from all three landforms and may see dykes, dykelands, and tidal wetlands as complementary: a landscape complex delivering a non-material service bundle centred on nature enjoyment and opportunities for reflection, with dykes as a key access point. Apartment residents indicate a preference for managed dyke realignment that will sustain that landscape complex. Further research is needed to capture a more representative sample, as well as understand more about the vulnerabilities and needs of apartment residents as distinct from those in houses.