Assessment of the Morphology of Selected Reference Sites on the Coast of Puerto Rico

In this project, a geomorphological assessment of 58 beach units on the coast of Puerto Rico was performed using a RTK GPS enabled Unoccupied Aerial Vehicle platform and Pix4d Mapper photogrammetry software. The total area of the coast that was covered in this project was 76.15 hectares for a total of 9.5 km of coastline covering the following municipalities: Aguada, Aguadilla, Añasco, Arecibo, Arroyo, Barceloneta, Cabo Rojo, Camuy, Carolina, Dorado, Fajardo, Guánica, Guayama, Hatillo, Humacao, Isabela, Lajas, Levittown, Loiza, Luquillo, Manatí, Maunabo, Mayaguez, Naguabo, Ponce, Rincón, San Juan, Vega Alta and Vega Baja.

The ultimate goal of this work is to contribute updated imagery and important data on the current state of the coastal environment of the main island of the Archipelago of Puerto Rico.

Beach metrics and other important social, physical and biotic indices were calculated for each of the sites. These data are useful in the monitoring of erosion, accretion, shoreline changes and are very important for management, planning and restoration of the coast.