Goleta, CA Coastal Erosion Rate
Is the coast eroding 8 miles west of Goleta, CA?
8 miles west of Goleta, CA: USGS's transects didn't pick up a trend here that beats the survey's own uncertainty. That's the majority case nationally, and for this stretch specifically it means the coast is holding, not that the data failed to find anything.
The grain of this number
This is a roughly 3.5-mile stretch of coast, not one address or parcel - USGS's own transects run every few hundred feet, but that's finer than any one property needs, so this page reports the stretch nearest Goleta, CA. Centered near 34.45°N, 120.00°W. The survey behind it runs to 1852-2016, in USGS's California assessment, using the LRR method. Shoreline surveys aren't repeated every year, so this is the most recent long-term measurement USGS has published for this coast, not a live reading.
How solid is this number
Averaging 79 separate transects produced this segment's rate, with 78% individually reading as erosion, rather than relying on any single survey line. The published margin on this reading runs ±0.11 ft/yr. Taken at face value, this segment's raw -0.11 ft/yr reading would land it 638 of 1211 nationally - a number worth ignoring, since it's statistical noise rather than a real trend. Source: USGS National Shoreline Change data release (ScienceBase, DOI 10.5066/P94J0K7Z), Kratzmann 2024 / Data Report 1187. Manhattan Beach, CA sits at national rank 1040 for growth (0.58 ft/yr), one reference point among the 1211 scored segments, 98 miles from here. 3 miles away, Goleta, CA is the nearest other measured stretch: slight erosion at 0.28 ft/yr.
One address near Goleta: the Coastal Change Hazards Portal zooms past this stretch to the underlying map.