A study on the relative importance of coastal environmental elements by a questionnaire survey and development of an environmental evaluation method

Abstract

This study presents results of questionnaire surveys to determine weighting factors of coastal environmental elements, which constitute natural environment of the coastal zone and field studies to measure values of these elements at 12 major coastal sites along the Kyushu. By using the acquired weighting factors and values of the coastal environmental elements, proposed is a new methodology to evaluate the degree of physical environment and bio-chemical environment at the specific coastal sites. A relationship between characteristics of the respondents and the relative important factors of the elements is identified and environmental characteristics of the study sites are discussed.