Abstract:
The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) maintains shoreline positions for the United States' coasts from both older sources, such as aerial photographs or topographic surveys, and contemporary sources, such as lidar-point clouds and digital elevation models. These shorelines are compiled and analyzed in the USGS Digital Shoreline Analysis System (DSAS), version 5.1 software to calculate rates of change. Keeping a record of historical shoreline positions is an effective method to monitor change over time, enabling scientists to identify areas most susceptible to erosion or accretion. These data can help coastal managers understand which areas of the coast are vulnerable to change. This data release, and other associated products, represent an expansion of the USGS national-scale shoreline database to include Puerto Rico and its islands, Vieques and Culebra. The USGS, in cooperation with the Coastal Research and Planning Institute of Puerto Rico—part of the Graduate School of Planning at the University of Puerto Rico, Rio Piedras Campus—has derived and compiled a database of historical shoreline positions using a variety of methods. These historical shoreline data are then used to measure the rate of shoreline change over time. Rate calculations are computed within a geographic information system (GIS) using the DSAS version 5.1 software. Starting from a user defined baseline, measurement transects are created by DSAS that intersect the shoreline vectors. The resulting intersections provide the location and time information necessary to calculate rates of shoreline change. The overall project contains shorelines, baselines, shoreline change rates (long-term and short-term), and shoreline intersects (long-term and short-term), for Puerto Rico, and the adjacent islands of Vieques and Culebra.
Purpose:
This dataset includes a reference baseline used by the Digital Shoreline Analysis System (DSAS) to calculate rate-of-change statistics for the main island of Puerto Rico. The baseline layer serves as the starting point for orthogonally-oriented transects generated by the DSAS application. The transects intersect each shoreline and establish measurement points used to calculate shoreline change rates.
Supplemental_Information:
Version 2.0 includes a baseline updated with new baseline ID values, to reduce the post-processing need to compile data for publication.
Theme:
Theme_Keyword_Thesaurus: ISO 19115 Topic Category
Theme_Keyword: oceans
Theme_Keyword: environment
Theme_Keyword: geoscientificInformation
Theme:
Theme_Keyword_Thesaurus: None
Theme_Keyword: Baseline
Theme_Keyword: Shoreline
Theme_Keyword: Shoreline Change
Theme_Keyword: Digital Shoreline Analysis System
Theme_Keyword: DSAS
Theme_Keyword: U.S. Geological Survey
Theme_Keyword: USGS
Theme_Keyword: Coastal and Marine Geology Program
Theme_Keyword: CMGP
Theme_Keyword: Woods Hole Coastal and Marine Science Center
Theme_Keyword: WHCMSC
Theme_Keyword: Puerto Rico Shoreline Change
Theme_Keyword: University of Puerto Rico
Theme_Keyword: University of Puerto Rico Graduate School of Planning
Theme_Keyword: Coastal Research and Planning Institute of Puerto Rico
Theme:
Theme_Keyword_Thesaurus: USGS Thesaurus
Theme_Keyword: geospatial datasets
Theme_Keyword: coastal processes
Theme:
Theme_Keyword_Thesaurus: USGS Metadata Identifier
Theme_Keyword: USGS:6149f9fad34e0df5fb96fc1a
Place:
Place_Keyword_Thesaurus: None
Place_Keyword: Atlantic Coast
Place_Keyword: United States
Place_Keyword: Caribbean
Place_Keyword: Puerto Rico
Public domain data from the U.S. Government are freely redistributable with proper metadata and source attribution. Please recognize the U.S. Geological Survey as the originator of the dataset. These data are not to be used for navigation.
