Bolivar Peninsula, TX Coastal Erosion Rate
Is the coast eroding 3.8 miles west of Bolivar Peninsula, TX?
Good news, and an honest one: USGS's data can't distinguish this stretch, 3.8 miles west of Bolivar Peninsula, TX, from a flat trend. Whatever small movement it measured here is statistical noise, not a reliable direction, so none is claimed.
What this reading actually covers
USGS surveys the coast in transects spaced a few hundred feet apart; this page groups the nearest ones into a single ~3.5-mile reading for the stretch closest to Bolivar Peninsula, TX, rather than showing one arbitrary line. Segment center: 29.48, -94.63. Survey years: 2001, method LRR, from USGS's Gulf of Mexico shoreline-change assessment. That's how current the data is here, real, but not a live feed, since a shoreline survey is a major undertaking, not an annual check-in.
How solid is this number
Averaging 25 separate transects produced this segment's rate, with 4% individually reading as erosion, rather than relying on any single survey line. Uncertainty on this specific number: 0.29 ft/yr either side. The unadjusted figure here, 0.05 ft/yr, would place it 817 of 1211 if ranked directly - but an unreliable rank isn't a useful one, which is exactly why "no significant trend" is the headline instead. Source: USGS Open-File Report 2004-1089. Long Beach, CA sits at national rank 1089 for growth (0.89 ft/yr), one reference point among the 1211 scored segments, 1412 miles from here. 1.8 miles away, Bolivar Peninsula, TX is the nearest other measured stretch: moderate erosion at 1.27 ft/yr.
Not this whole stretch, just Bolivar Peninsula itself: the Coastal Change Hazards Portal is USGS's own live version of this data.