Destin, FL Coastal Erosion Rate
Is the coast eroding 1.7 miles west of Destin, FL?
Good news, and an honest one: USGS's data can't distinguish this stretch, 1.7 miles west of Destin, FL, 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 Destin, FL, rather than showing one arbitrary line. Segment center: 30.41, -86.50. 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 backs this reading up
This reading comes from 90 individual transects averaged together, 28% of which measured erosion rather than growth. USGS's confidence interval here is ±3.18 ft/yr. The unadjusted figure here, 0.73 ft/yr, would place it 1066 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. For scale: Quinby, VA, 788 miles away, ranks 1183 of 1211 nationally for growth, 3.21 ft/yr. Lake Lorraine, FL, 2.9 miles off, is the adjacent measured stretch, itself no significant trend.
Destin, FL on the source map: try the Coastal Change Hazards Portal, zoomable well past this page's ~3.5-mile grain.