Kihei, HI Coastal Erosion Rate
Is the coast eroding 1.7 miles southwest of Kihei, HI?
Good news, and an honest one: USGS's data can't distinguish this stretch, 1.7 miles southwest of Kihei, HI, 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 Kihei, HI, rather than showing one arbitrary line. Segment center: 20.75, -156.46. Survey years: 2007-2010, method WLR, from USGS's Hawaii 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.
Where this fits nationally
This reading comes from 282 individual transects averaged together, 68% of which measured erosion rather than growth. USGS's confidence interval here is ±0.36 ft/yr. The unadjusted figure here, -0.2 ft/yr, would place it 505 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 2011-1009. Rank 1093 nationally for growth belongs to Inwood, NY, 4924 miles from this stretch, measured at 0.91 ft/yr. Maalaea, HI, 2.5 miles off, is the adjacent measured stretch, itself no significant trend.
Kihei, HI on the source map: try the Coastal Change Hazards Portal, zoomable well past this page's ~3.5-mile grain.