Virginia Beach, VA Coastal Erosion Rate
What USGS measures 11.2 miles southeast of Virginia Beach, VA
Averaged across every transect USGS ran 11.2 miles southeast of Virginia Beach, VA, the shoreline has been moving inland at 0.93 feet a year, a real measured rate, not a regional estimate applied to this stretch. At that rate, the shoreline has lost roughly 9.3 feet over the last decade.
What "Virginia Beach" means on this page
Virginia Beach, VA is the nearest named place, 11.2 miles away, to a ~3.5-mile stretch of coast USGS has surveyed - the reading below covers that whole stretch, not a single property in it. Segment center: 36.65, -75.92. The survey behind it runs to 2007-2009, in USGS's New England / Mid-Atlantic 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.
What 0.93 ft/yr means over time
Run 11.2 miles southeast of Virginia Beach, VA's 0.93 ft/yr rate forward 25 years and it implies about 23 feet of further retreat, assuming nothing changes, which is exactly the assumption a seawall or nourishment project exists to break.
How solid is this number
96 transects feed this segment's number; 100% of them individually measured retreat. USGS's confidence interval here is ±0.46 ft/yr. Sorted from fastest erosion to fastest growth across all 1211 measured segments nationally, this one lands at 206. Source: USGS Open-File Report 2010-1119. Rank 539 nationally for erosion belongs to North Scituate, MA, 474 miles from this stretch, measured at 0.17 ft/yr, 0.2x this stretch's rate. 1.8 miles away, Virginia Beach, VA is the nearest other measured stretch: moderate erosion at 2.07 ft/yr.
One address near Virginia Beach: the Coastal Change Hazards Portal zooms past this stretch to the underlying map.