Carrabelle, FL Coastal Erosion Rate
Is the coast eroding 3.5 miles south of Carrabelle, FL?
Averaged across every transect USGS ran 3.5 miles south of Carrabelle, FL, the shoreline has been moving inland at 2.18 feet a year, a real measured rate, not a regional estimate applied to this stretch. At that rate, the shoreline has lost roughly 21.8 feet over the last decade.
What this reading actually covers
Carrabelle, FL is the nearest named place, 3.5 miles away, to a ~3.5-mile stretch of coast USGS has surveyed - the reading below covers that whole stretch, not a single property in it. Segment center: 29.81, -84.65. 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 2.18 ft/yr means over time
Run 3.5 miles south of Carrabelle, FL's 2.18 ft/yr rate forward 25 years and it implies about 55 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 102 individual transects averaged together, 89% of which measured erosion rather than growth. USGS's confidence interval here is ±0.83 ft/yr. Sorted from fastest erosion to fastest growth across all 1211 measured segments nationally, this one lands at 124. Source: USGS Open-File Report 2004-1089. Rank 210 nationally for erosion belongs to Dewey Beach, DE, 821 miles from this stretch, measured at 0.91 ft/yr, 0.4x this stretch's rate. 2.6 miles up the coast, Carrabelle, FL shows 0.52 ft/yr of eroding.
Carrabelle, FL on the source map: try the Coastal Change Hazards Portal, zoomable well past this page's ~3.5-mile grain.