South Padre Island, TX Coastal Erosion Rate
What USGS measures 3.4 miles south of South Padre Island, TX
The coast 3.4 miles south of South Padre Island, TX shows no statistically significant trend either way. USGS's transects measured a rate here, but it's smaller than the survey's own margin of error for this stretch, so calling it "eroding" or "growing" would overstate what the data actually shows.
The grain of this number
Nothing here is parcel-level. USGS's raw transects run every few hundred feet along the shore; this page averages the ones nearest South Padre Island, TX into one ~3.5-mile reading rather than picking a single arbitrary line to represent the area. Centered near 26.07°N, 97.18°W. 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.
Where this fits nationally
17 transects feed this segment's number; 100% of them individually measured retreat. The published margin on this reading runs ±3.8 ft/yr. Taken at face value, this segment's raw -1.22 ft/yr reading would land it 181 of 1211 nationally - a number worth ignoring, since it's statistical noise rather than a real trend. Source: USGS Open-File Report 2004-1089. Newport Beach, CA sits at national rank 1098 for growth (0.94 ft/yr), one reference point among the 1211 scored segments, 1343 miles from here. 2 miles away, South Padre Island, TX is the nearest other measured stretch: also no significant trend.
South Padre Island, TX on the source map: try the Coastal Change Hazards Portal, zoomable well past this page's ~3.5-mile grain.