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U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 2011-1009

National Assessment of Shoreline Change: A GIS Compilation of Vector Shorelines and Associated Shoreline Change Data for the Sandy Shorelines of Kauai, Oahu, and Maui, Hawaii


Introduction

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This compilation of open-ocean, sandy shorelines for three of the eight main Hawaiian islands (Kauai, Oahu, and Maui) is part of a series that includes already published shoreline data for the Gulf of Mexico, Southeast Atlantic, California, New England, and Mid-Atlantic coasts (Morton and others, 2004; Morton and Miller, 2005; Hapke and others, 2006; Hapke and others, 2010). Additional areas that have been identifed for future study of shoreline change include the Pacific Northwest and Alaska. The Hawaii shoreline data differ from the data in previously published U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) reports in the series in that shorelines derived from lidar (Light Detection and Ranging) data were not utilized.  Attempts were made to use all available historical shoreline data from aerial photographs and topographic survey sheets that meet minimum quality standards for resolution and positional accuracy.  The Hawaii shoreline data provided with this report incorporate all available shorelines that were used in calculating shoreline-change rates. Typically, one historical shoreline is available for each decade from the early 1900s through the 2000s. The Kauai, Oahu, and Maui coasts were divided into a total of 11 analysis regions for the purposes of reporting regional trends in shoreline-change rates. Long-term rates were calculated from all available shorelines, whereas short-term rates were calculated from post-World War II shorelines only. 

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