Digitizing Maryland's Eastern Shore Coastal Bays

A look at how Islands eroded over time and if the islands are habitable for the local Shorebirds.

Richard Goodwin

I am a senior at Stephen Decatur High School and Worcester Technical High School working under the Tech School's GIS Program. In the GIS Program, I have been working on my Capstone Project for the class for the past five months. The goal of this Capstone project is to see if the islands are habitable or not for the local shorebirds. This process started from me choosing a problem to tackle with my Capstone project, and the problem of it was that the islands’ area has been lost throughout the years, and we want people to see how much has been lost so far. The way I chose to solve this problem was by mapping the islands on ArcMap Desktop.

I then talked with my client for this project, Ms. Carly Toulan who works for the Maryland Coastal Bays Program. We talked about how I would map out the islands, we discussed the progress bi-weekly, and she helped start me off with the digitizing, as she had digitized a few of the islands in Assawoman Bay prior to me starting.

Here are images of activities they are currently doing and displays of the bay areas.

The goal of the Maryland Coastal Bays Program states that, "As a National Estuary Program, Maryland Coastal Bays Program (MCBP) is a non-profit partnership among the towns of Ocean City and Berlin, the National Park Service (NPS), Worcester County, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and the Maryland Departments of Natural Resources, Agriculture and Planning. One of only 28 such programs nationwide, our goal is to protect and enhance the watershed, which includes Ocean City, Ocean Pines and Berlin, and Assateague Island National Seashore. East of Route 113, the 175-square mile watershed is home to the treasured resources of the St. Martin River, Newport Bay, Assawoman Bay, Isle of Wight Bay, Sinepuxent Bay and Chincoteague Bay. The watershed includes more than 189,000 acres of land, 71,000 acres of water, 248 miles of shoreline, and nearly 35,000 acres of wetlands." - Maryland Coastal Bays Program

To accomplish this goal, the Foundation:

  • Engages federal, state, and local partners as well as the public in defining the health concerns and conservation needs of the Coastal Bays and their watersheds;
  • Implements management strategies defined in the Comprehensive Conservation Management Plan (CCMP) in accordance with the Federal Clean Water Act as the Maryland Coastal Bays National Estuary Program;
  • Develops and uses factual scientific information to improve the health and sustainable use of the Coastal Bays and their watersheds;
  • Promotes responsible stewardship and actions to improve the Coastal
  • Bays and their watersheds through public outreach and education; and
  • Conducts fundraising activities to secure public and private grants and donations to support environmental improvements beyond those provided by existing funding sources.

Other data I used for this Capstone project came from ArcGIS's Living Atlas, in the form of the 2019/2019 Satellite View image of the bay areas, and I used another layer that outlined said bay areas from Esri. I also used a point layer made by my teacher Mrs. Gallo and my fellow classmate Brennan Morris. The green points of the point layer represent the islands that have been completed, and the orange points represent islands that have yet to be mapped.

Assawoman Bay

I began digitizing with ArcMap in Assawoman Bay. I did this via the Create Features Tool on the Editor toolbar. I began near the top, but the further I went down, the larger the islands got, and then I went head first into a roadblock. There was a massive island in the middle if the bay that seemed unmappable at first, but then, I realized that I could create a rough draft of the island, and then I could use the Reshape Feature Tool for the Editor toolbar.

The way I was able to achieve and accurate shape of each island was by zooming into the islands and mapping on a smaller scale.

This is the chart I used to plan this entire Capstone project. Unfortunately, I was unable to finish digitizing all of the islands due to roadblocks and some fairly large islands when doing the project.

Here is what the bay looked like at the beginning, during, and after I finished the mapping Assawoman bay. As I was digitizing the islands, I updated the points from orange to green.

The before and after pictures from the Isle of Wight Bay Area.

The before and after pictures of Newport and Sinepuxent Bays.

Work in Progress pictures of Chincoteague Bay.

Here is the final map that I have made.

Here is the finished map and layers: Layers:  https://arcg.is/04Xuez  Map:  https://arcg.is/0DuqOO  The layer I have published will be much easier to edit when doing previous years of islands layers, as you can use the Reshape Feature Tool to edit the island's shape rather than starting from scratch. If you, the reader, would like to contribute and help with this project, you will need to finish the initial layer by mapping out the final islands. Next, you will need to digitize the previous years of available imagery as well. Another way you could help is by calculating the island area that has been lost over the course of the multiple previous maps.

In all, this Capstone project was a great learning experience and helped me learn a lot about the local area and ArcMap Desktop. This project also let me help a local program and gave me a bit of experience in the work field.

This is an interactive map of the Maryland Coastal Bays Islands Capstone Project. You will be able to zoom in and look at the different islands and point that I both did and did not digitize.

Acknowledgements: I would like to thank Ms. Carly Toulan, Mrs. Silviya Gallo, and Brennen Morris for helping along the way with this project.

This is the chart I used to plan this entire Capstone project. Unfortunately, I was unable to finish digitizing all of the islands due to roadblocks and some fairly large islands when doing the project.

Here is the final map that I have made.