The Washington Marine Shoreline Public Access Project

The Washington Marine Shoreline Public Access Project is a geographic information system database that identifies the location and length of all publicly accessible marine shorelines in the state of Washington.

The Washington Marine Shoreline Public Access Project was released to the public in December 2008. The shapefile and metadata are available to download at Ecology's GIS Download Page. It answers many of these questions about ownership and public accessibility of our coastline. The data will also combine information from the ShoreZone classification project (Nearshore Habitat Group, WADNR, 1994-2000) ShoreZone , a geospatial dataset summarizing the physical and biological characteristics of the shoreline. With this data combination, we can answer big picture spatial questions about the distribution of biological communities, geological features, and anthropogenic development among public shorelines in Washington.

There are many potential uses for this dataset, ranging from identifying potential restoration sites, to mapping spill response routes. How many miles of publicly accessible shorelines are in each County? How many miles of public shorelines have aquatic vegetation? How many miles of public shorelines are armored? These questions and more can be answered using the Washington Marine Shoreline Public Access Project.

Have Questions? Please contact us.

After viewing the data if you see something that needs updating, please send us an email at shorelinepublicaccess@ecy.wa.gov