Geologic Division U.S. National Coastal AssessmentProject Leader:Dr. Christopher C. Barton 600 Fourth Street South, St. Petersburg, FL 33701-4846 E-mail: barton@usgs.gov Phone: (813) 893-3100 ext. 3014 Fax: (813) 893-3333 The IssueThe coastal margin of the US is among the most densely populated, developed, property valued, tax generating, income generating, and recreational valued region of the US. The dynamic natural processes and human-induced changes within this margin are poorly understood yet result in a highly mobile coastal zone that is subject to rapid (decadal or less) change. The goal of this project is to develop a GIS based inventory of scientific data including those variables known to contribute to coastal change. This data base will provide a quantitative basis for making real time and long-term forecasts of future coastal change in response to storms, sea level rise, tectonics, beach renourishment, land use changes, for landuse and other policy managers.Construction of a national data base on the scientific variables thought to control coastal change will provide a data base for scientific analysis and modeling over length scales of meters to hundreds of kilometers and over time scales from one to one-hundred years. The Committee on Beach Nourishment and Protection of the National Research Council (Beach Nourishment and Protection, National Academy Press, Washington, DC, 1995, p. 157) has recommended that the USGS in collaboration with the Army Corps of Engineers and NOAA initiate a cooperative program to construct and maintain a data base that would document decadal rates of erosion and accretion for all US shorelines. The USGS Marine and Coastal Program prospectus states that it supports fundamental and mission investigations aimed at a systematic understanding and description of the geologic setting, geologic history, geologic processes, geohazards, and seafloor environmental conditions of the US coastal and offshore areas.
How the USGS is addressing this issueThis project will develop a GIS based inventory of US shoreline position, coastal topography/bathymetry, land use, sedimentology, geology, storm history, and sea level change in order to assess past and current rates of shoreline change and to provide a scientific data base that includes those variables known to contribute to shoreline change. The ultimate use of this data base is to provide a quantitative basis for making real time and long-term forecasts of future US shoreline position, coastal topography/bathymetry, sedimentology, geology, storm history, in order to assess past and current rates of coastal change.The long term strategy is to assemble and maintain a GIS based data base that would document past and present coastal change and include that data in order to assess past decadal, current rates, and to forecast future rates of coastal change. Over ten years, the project will develop and make available a consistent GIS based archive of historic shoreline positions, and establish the topography of the coastal zone at a high level of resolution.
1998 ActivitiesPrimary focus of the first year will be to document, assess, and obtain existing data on historic shoreline positions, and LIDAR data on the present topography/bathymetry for South Carolina and to produce a user friendly CD-ROM product and a WEB site.
USGS Cooperators
ProductsDevelopment of a web site (http://coastal.er.usgs.gov/scpilot-assessment/) / CD-ROM devoted to this project is slated for the first year of the project.
U.S. Department of the Interior, U.S. Geological Survey, Center for Coastal Geology This page is: http://coastal.er.usgs.gov/projects98/7242-33310.html Address questions and comments about this page to: webmaster@cfcg.er.usgs.gov Updated: 28 May, 1998@04:55:50 PM (THF) |