The Physical Oceanography Library contains station locations where observations of current and hydrographic properties (temperature, salinity, water chemistry) have been made. These include stations occupied during the Massachusetts Bay Circulation Experiment (Geyer and others, 1992), stations that are part of the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority Outfall Monitoring Program (Albro and others, 1998), and locations of USGS long-term current and sediment transport monitoring sites. Signell and others (1996), using a three dimensional circulation model, developed predictions of effluent dilution for discharge from the existing outfall in the harbor and the new outfall in Massachusetts Bay in winter and summer. These simulations show that relocating the outfall will result in improved water quality in the harbor and not be significantly different in Massachusetts Bay, except in the immediate vicinity of the outfall. Data from some of these stations (and other data) are available from the Gulf of Maine Information System (http://oracle.er.usgs.gov/GoMaine).

Coverages provided in Library 6 include:

• Station locations for the Massachusetts Bay circulation experiment (Geyer and others, 1992)
• USGS current monitoring stations  (Boston Buoy and Scituate)
• Effluent dilution estimates based on hydrodynamic models for present and future outfall (Signell and others, 1997; Signell, 1997). These coverages are diplayed in geographic (g) coordinates as well as in Mercator (m) projection. (Note: ArcView will allow a view containing shape files in geographic coordinates to be projected to a Mercator projection to allow the map to be viewed in true perspective (see the Introduction for more information). However, image files (TIF), such as the bathymetry, shaded relief, backscatter intensity, and pseudocolored files cannot be projected. Thus the TIF images are available in both the geographic coordinate system and Mercator Projection so that the images may be viewed with the geographic data, or in true perspective with any projected shape files) .

• Massachusetts Water Resources Authority (MWRA) Outfall Monitoring Program

Coverages provided in Library 6:       (Summary metadata for files in the Library 3 view are listed alphabetically in the table below. For complete metadata, go to directory "9_biblio" on this CD-ROM and open the file metadata.mdb using Microsoft Access or the file Gismeta.htm using your browser.)