Sedimentary Environment Map of Long Island Sound Estuary

Long Island Sound is a 150 km long, 30 km wide estuary with a mean water depth of 24 m. This GIS layer represents a U.S. Geological Survey interpretation of sea-floor sedimentary environments, created from sidescan-sonar, seismic-reflection, and sediment sample data. The work was conducted in cooperation with the State of Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Use Cases

• Modeling the long-term fate of contaminants based on interpreted sedimentary environments.
• Understanding the distribution of benthic biologic habitats from sea-floor sediment data.
• Conducting regional environmental assessments using the GIS layer of sedimentary environments.

Strengths

• Interpretation is based on multiple data sources: sidescan-sonar, seismic-reflection profiles, and sediment samples.
• Covers a significant estuary: Long Island Sound is 150 km long and 30 km across at its widest point.
• Data was reprojected into a modern coordinate system (UTM zone 18 NAD 83) for publication.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Last update date is unknown; freshness unverified.

Provenance

Source

U.S. Geological Survey Coastal and Marine Geology Program, in cooperation with the State of Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Collection Method

Interpretation hand-drawn from geophysical and sample data, then digitized and processed in Arc/Info and ArcView.

Time Range

null

Freshness

Last updated date is unknown.

Geography

Long Island Sound, a glacially produced estuary along the Atlantic coast of the United States.