Davenport, CA Coastal Erosion Rate
What USGS measures 6.3 miles northwest of Davenport, CA
Good news, and an honest one: USGS's data can't distinguish this stretch, 6.3 miles northwest of Davenport, CA, 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 Davenport, CA, rather than showing one arbitrary line. Segment center: 37.08, -122.27. Survey years: 1852-2016, method LRR, from USGS's California 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.
What backs this reading up
36 transects feed this segment's number; 97% of them individually measured retreat. The published margin on this reading runs ±0.29 ft/yr. The unadjusted figure here, -0.24 ft/yr, would place it 459 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 National Shoreline Change data release (ScienceBase, DOI 10.5066/P94J0K7Z), Kratzmann 2024 / Data Report 1187. Seal Beach, CA sits at national rank 1053 for growth (0.63 ft/yr), one reference point among the 1211 scored segments, 331 miles from here. 2.1 miles up the coast, Davenport, CA shows 0.67 ft/yr of eroding.
Davenport, CA on the source map: try the Coastal Change Hazards Portal, zoomable well past this page's ~3.5-mile grain.