Boothville, LA Coastal Erosion Rate
What USGS measures 45.8 miles northeast of Boothville, LA
USGS's shoreline-change data puts this stretch, 45.8 miles northeast of Boothville, LA, at 10.52 feet of erosion a year on average, a long-term rate for this specific ~3.5-mile section, not one storm's damage. At that rate, the shoreline has lost roughly 105.2 feet over the last decade.
The grain of this number
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 Boothville, LA, rather than showing one arbitrary line. Segment center: 29.80, -88.86. USGS's Gulf of Mexico assessment last surveyed this stretch through 2001, computing the rate with its LRR method. Other US regions were surveyed in different years, sometimes decades apart, so this page states its own rather than implying one national vintage.
What 10.52 ft/yr means over time
Run 45.8 miles northeast of Boothville, LA's 10.52 ft/yr rate forward 25 years and it implies about 263 feet of further retreat, assuming nothing changes, which is exactly the assumption a seawall or nourishment project exists to break.
How solid is this number
This reading comes from 107 individual transects averaged together, 100% of which measured erosion rather than growth. The published margin on this reading runs ±3.69 ft/yr. This segment ranks 21 of 1211 measured US coastal segments, ordered from fastest erosion to fastest growth. Source: USGS Open-File Report 2004-1089. Rank 328 nationally for erosion belongs to Paia, HI, 4204 miles from this stretch, measured at 0.44 ft/yr, a small fraction of this stretch's own rate. Boothville, LA, 1.9 miles off, is the adjacent measured stretch, reading severe erosion at 13.9 ft/yr.
One address near Boothville: the Coastal Change Hazards Portal zooms past this stretch to the underlying map.