Shoreline length and water area in the ocean, coastal, and Great Lakes parks (second edition): Updated statistics for shoreline miles and water acres
Winchell A, Helinski O, Curdts T, LaFrance Bartley M. 2024. Shoreline length and water area in the ocean, coastal, and Great Lakes parks (second edition): Updated statistics for shoreline miles and water acres. Natural Resource Report. NPS/NRSS/WRD/NRR—2024/2633. National Park Service. Fort Collins, Colorado. https://doi.org/10.36967/2299484
This report details the cumulative shoreline miles and water acres within the 88 ocean, coastal, and Great Lakes National Park units. Across the National Park Service (NPS), there is a total of 14,350 shoreline miles and 2,534,595 water acres. This report serves as an update to the NPS Natural Resource Report titled, “Shoreline length and water area in the ocean, coastal and Great Lakes Parks: Updated statistics for shoreline miles and water acres (rev 1b)” (Curdts 2011). Note: For park units located in ocean settings, “water acres” refers to marine, estuarine, and tidally influenced waters. For park units in the Great Lakes region, “water acres” refers to freshwater. For all park units, freshwater bodies such as lakes, ponds, and rivers that exist inland of the marine or Great Lake shoreline are excluded from the calculation. Existing shoreline products from federal, state, and NPS sources were visually assessed for each park and compared to reference imagery within ESRI ArcGIS Pro to determine the best available data. The resulting shoreline delineation for each park was reviewed by NPS park, regional, national, and/or Inventory and Monitoring Network staff, and manual adjustments were made as needed to accurately reflect the shoreline. Park boundaries were defined according to the NPS Land Resources Division (LRD), with a few exceptions as noted within the report. Shoreline miles and water acres within each park’s boundary were then calculated within a GIS framework. The results of this report represent a snapshot in time, and variation is to be expected given the dynamic nature of coastal environments. Future updates to these statistics may be calculated as new data become available. These shoreline miles and water acres statistics and associated geospatial data and maps are intended for general reference only; they are useful for describing the scale of NPS holdings and management responsibilities.
- Type
- Published Report
- Authors
- Winchell, Alyssa; Helinski, Olivia; Curdts, Thom; LaFrance Bartley, Monique
- Date of Issue
- 2024-03
- Publisher
- National Park Service
- DOI
- 10.36967/2299484
- Units
- GRD , NRSS , OCRB , WRD
- Keywords
- Boundaries, Coastal, Data, Geographic Information Systems (GIS), GIS, Great Lakes, Mapping, Marine, Ocean, Shoreline, Shoreline Miles, Statistics, Submerged Resources, Water Area