Virginia Beach, VA Coastal Erosion Rate
What USGS measures 14.4 miles southeast of Virginia Beach, VA
The coast 14.4 miles southeast of Virginia Beach, VA has been retreating at a measured 0.61 feet a year, USGS's own long-term rate for this stretch, built from historical shoreline positions rather than a single survey. At that rate, the shoreline has lost roughly 6.1 feet over the last decade.
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 Virginia Beach, VA. Centered near 36.60°N, 75.90°W. USGS's New England / Mid-Atlantic assessment last surveyed this stretch through 2007-2009, 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.
25 years at this rate
If 0.61 ft/yr holds for the next 25 years, the coast 14.4 miles southeast of Virginia Beach, VA would retreat roughly 15 more feet, a projection, not a certainty: erosion rates shift with storms, sediment supply and any armoring built in the meantime.
Where this fits nationally
This reading comes from 115 individual transects averaged together, 100% of which measured erosion rather than growth. Uncertainty on this specific number: 0.52 ft/yr either side. Sorted from fastest erosion to fastest growth across all 1211 measured segments nationally, this one lands at 261. Source: USGS Open-File Report 2010-1119. Rank 166 nationally for erosion belongs to Stowell, TX, 1170 miles from this stretch, measured at 1.4 ft/yr, 2.3x this stretch's rate. 2.7 miles away, Coinjock, NC is the nearest other measured stretch: also no significant trend.
One address near Virginia Beach: the Coastal Change Hazards Portal zooms past this stretch to the underlying map.