British Columbia’s coastline stretches for more than 25,000 kilometres—one of the longest and most ecologically complex in the world. Kelp forests, eelgrass meadows, salmon-bearing rivers, and deep fjords support an extraordinary diversity of life and sustain communities that have stewarded these waters since time immemorial.
June 11th, 2026
CoastConnect: Turning Data into Impact for a Resilient Coast
The coast of British Columbia stretches for more than 25,000 kilometres, encompassing a mosaic of islands, fjords, kelp forests, estuaries, and beaches. CoastConnect was developed to help make ecological information from these environments more accessible and useful for stewardship and decision-making.
But monitoring and understanding such a vast coastline is no simple task.
Across BC, First Nations, Guardian programs, researchers, conservation groups, and coastal communities are collecting enormous amounts of valuable environmental data. Yet much of that work happens in isolation. Monitoring methods vary between organizations, data systems are often incompatible, and access to tools and technical expertise can be uneven—particularly for communities working in remote areas closest to the resource itself.
At a time when coastal ecosystems are facing increasing pressure from climate change, habitat loss, and shifting ocean conditions, the need for coordinated and usable monitoring information has never been greater.
CoastConnect—a new Hakai Institute initiative—was built to address exactly this challenge.
One Platform, from Field to Decision
Launched at coastconnect.ca, CoastConnect is a free, open-access platform that brings together the tools, workflows, resources, and real-world examples that coastal stewards need—all in one place. The goal is straightforward: help monitoring programs move from collecting data in the field to making informed conservation and management decisions.
At the heart of CoastConnect is the idea of data mobilization: transforming field observations into accessible, usable information that can support stewardship, management, research, and policy. In practice, that means helping organizations not only collect data, but organize it, understand it, share it, and ultimately apply it in meaningful ways.
The platform is organized around 4 interconnected resources:
Monitoring Methods: provides step-by-step guidance for common techniques. To start, we are highlighting methods used for kelp monitoring, including kelp drone mapping and biodiversity assessments, including environmental DNA (eDNA) sampling.
The Resource Library brings together protocols, templates, field guides, and data-processing tools in a freely searchable format.
Case Studies highlight real-world examples from organizations across BC where monitoring has informed stewardship and management decisions.
Monitoring Networks offers a regional view of existing monitoring activity along the coast, helping identify opportunities for collaboration and shared learning.
Whether an organization is designing a new monitoring program, improving existing workflows, or looking to connect with others doing similar work, CoastConnect is designed as a practical tool built around real needs.
Built With the Communities It Serves
CoastConnect’s initial version was developed through the MCT CoastConnect project, co-funded by Fisheries and Oceans Canada. From the beginning, the platform was shaped in close partnership with First Nations, Guardian Watchmen programs, regional planning bodies, and conservation organizations—the very communities who need it most.
Members of a First Nations Guardian program conduct kelp monitoring in the Broughton Archipelago. CoastConnect was designed to support coastal monitoring efforts by helping organizations access methods, training materials, tools, and case studies in one place.
That collaborative approach is central to CoastConnect’s philosophy. Coastal monitoring works best when knowledge flows in multiple directions: scientific tools support local stewardship, and place-based experience sharpens scientific understanding. The platform reflects that, grounding its methods and resources in practical realities identified by the partners who helped build it.
Spotlight: KelpExplorer
Among CoastConnect’s most compelling tools is KelpExplorer (kelpexplorer.hakai.org), an interactive mapping application that makes years of Hakai kelp monitoring data freely accessible.
Kelp forests are among BC’s most ecologically significant—and vulnerable—habitats. They provide food and shelter for fish, invertebrates, and marine mammals; they support Indigenous food systems and commercial fisheries; and they are sensitive early indicators of environmental change, including ocean warming and shifting sea urchin populations. Monitoring them consistently, at scale, has historically been difficult and expensive.
KelpExplorer allows users to visualize changes in kelp canopy extent over time along the BC coast, transforming years of aerial surveys and careful fieldwork into an accessible resource for researchers, stewardship organizations, and coastal communities alike. It is a strong example of data mobilization in action: hard-won field data made usable and meaningful for a much wider audience.
Local Data, Global Reach
CoastConnect does not operate in isolation. It sits within a broader ecosystem of ocean data infrastructure—and is designed to work with it.
At the national level, the platform complements the Canadian Integrated Ocean Observing System (CIOOS), which aggregates and publishes ocean data from across Canada to support research and policy. While CIOOS focuses on large-scale data accessibility, CoastConnect supports the organizations generating that data on the ground—helping build consistent workflows, improve data management, and strengthen long-term monitoring capacity.
The two are complementary. CoastConnect helps mobilize coastal monitoring data at the local and regional level, strengthening the quality and breadth of what flows into systems like CIOOS, which in turn amplifies the reach and impact of locally collected data.
That relationship extends internationally through the Ocean Biodiversity Information System (OBIS), a global network integrating marine biodiversity data from around the world. Monitoring data collected through CoastConnect-supported workflows—gathered in consistent, interoperable formats—is well-positioned to contribute to OBIS, connecting local stewardship to a planetary picture of ocean health.
In practical terms: a kelp survey conducted by a Guardian Watchmen program on the North Coast can inform local stewardship decisions and, through these larger systems, contribute to conservation understanding at regional, national, and global scales. Local knowledge, amplified.
Transforming field observations into usable information often requires data processing and interpretation. CoastConnect was developed to help make those workflows more accessible to coastal monitoring programs across British Columbia.
What’s Next
The successful launch of CoastConnect’s first phase has confirmed both the need for the platform and the appetite for it. Hakai and its partners will continue expanding CoastConnect over time—adding new monitoring methods, growing the resource library, strengthening regional monitoring networks, and deepening partnerships across the coast.
The platform is free, open-source, and built for the long term.
If you work on the BC coast—as a researcher, a resource manager, a Guardian, or a community steward—CoastConnect is built for you. Explore the platform, dig into the methods, browse the case studies, and reach out if you’d like to work together.
Visit coastconnect.ca to get started.
CoastConnect is a Hakai Institute initiative, supported by the Tula Foundation.