Texas coastal management program activity assessment routine ecological systems component: user's manual: DRAFT

This manual and the accompanying technical manual provide guidelines for implementation of the ecological systems component of the Activity Assessment Routine. The ecological systems component is a method of analysis for guiding philosophy in development of the component has been to first concentrate on structuring a systematic, logical, and documentable analytical framework. As a result, the procedure described in this manual is largely qualitative; descriptive ecological models have been developed and nonquantitative assessments have been compiled. Compilation of empirical data has been limited to design of a data referencing system under the theory that access to the data in a soundly-structured analytical context is a more pressing need than incorporation of available data into an analytical process.