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This is a Non-Federal dataset covered by different Terms of Use than Data.gov.

Calvert 40 years Shoreline Erosion Level

Metadata Updated: October 11, 2025

To quantify shoreline rates of change (erosion or accretion), Maryland Geological Survey (MGS) used historical and recent shorelines spanning 1960-2007 as input into the Digital Shoreline Analysis System (DSAS) Version 4.3. DSAS, a computer program developed by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), determines linear rates of shoreline change along closely spaced, shore-normal transects. Based on DSAS output, MGS assigned generalized rate of change categories as attributes to a recent shoreline for Calvert County. This recent shoreline consisted of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Continually Updated Shoreline Product (CUSP) digital shoreline currently available for Calvert County; and 2) portions of the Maryland Department of Natural Resources (MD DNR) Critical Area Commission (CAC) digital shoreline for Calvert County. Based on the results of an End Point Rate (EPR) analysis on the ca. 1960s shoreline and the ca. 2000 shoreline (recent shoreline), MGS grouped the rate results into the following general categories: (a) No change (-0.01 to 0.01 feet/year), (b) Accretion (greater than 0.01 feet/year), (c) Slight erosion rate (0 to -2 feet/year), (d) Low erosion rate (-2 to -4 feet/year), (e) Moderate erosion rate (-4 to -8 ft/yr), (f) High erosion rate (greater than -8 feet/year), (g) Protected, (h) No data (insufficient shorelines to calculate 40-year EPR rate), (i) No data (no transects cast; unprotected or unknown shoreline condition), and (j) Rates not delivered (calculated rates suspect). The CUSP shoreline represents the shoreline position in Calvert County between the years 2005-2006. The CAC shoreline represents the shoreline position in Calvert County in 2007. In Calvert County, the NOAA CUSP data set covered approximately 90% of the shoreline in the county. MGS supplemented the NOAA CUSP data with CAC data in the following areas where NOAA CUSP data was missing: Hunting Creek; upper 2/3 of Hall Creek; and Patuxent River, from approximately 1 kilometer south of the Merkle Wildlife Sanctuary, north to (and including) Lyons Creek. To identify which shoreline source is responsible for a shoreline segment, view the "DSAS_SRC" attribute table field -- "CAC" indicates a shoreline sourced from MD DNR CAC data set; "NOAA CUSP" indicates a shoreline sourced from the NOAA CUSP data set. Negative rate of change values indicate erosion, and positive values indicate accretion. In general, MGS tried to attribute lengths of shoreline of at least 80 meters in length sharing similar rates of change.

Access & Use Information

Public: This dataset is intended for public access and use. Non-Federal: This dataset is covered by different Terms of Use than Data.gov. License: No license information was provided.

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Dates

Metadata Created Date July 26, 2025
Metadata Updated Date October 11, 2025

Metadata Source

Harvested from md json

Additional Metadata

Resource Type Dataset
Metadata Created Date July 26, 2025
Metadata Updated Date October 11, 2025
Publisher opendata.maryland.gov
Maintainer
Identifier https://opendata.maryland.gov/api/views/ju53-sxh4
Data First Published 2025-07-21
Data Last Modified 2025-10-06
Public Access Level public
Metadata Context https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
Metadata Catalog ID https://opendata.maryland.gov/data.json
Schema Version https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
Catalog Describedby https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
Harvest Object Id dabc2bde-bb7e-4402-9b48-8866be9d5066
Harvest Source Id ee165ef5-7b35-41a7-b3a5-5479c71b0e58
Harvest Source Title md json
Homepage URL https://opendata.maryland.gov/d/ju53-sxh4
Source Datajson Identifier True
Source Hash f0ce9a40df8f04bad38da338bdd61cac9cd4579ee65cd0d92f288ed12c56d25d
Source Schema Version 1.1

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