InletTracker: An open-source Python toolkit for historic and near real-time monitoring of coastal inlets from Landsat and Sentinel-2

Despite their global abundance and high ecological and socio-economic significance, the dynamics of coastal inlets often remain poorly quantified at multi-decadal time scales. Here, we introduce InletTracker, a new tool that reconstructs the time-evolving state of dynamic coastal inlets over the las...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Earth and Space Science Open Archive ESSOAr
Main Authors: Heimhuber, Valentin, Vos, Kilian, Fu, Wanru, Glamore, William
Format: Paper
Language:English
Published: Washington American Geophysical Union 17.03.2021
Subjects:
Coastal dynamics
Coastal engineering
Coastal inlets
Coastal management
Coastal zone management
Environmental monitoring
Floodplains
Geomorphology
Inlets
Landforms
Landsat
Landsat satellites
Monitoring
Open source software
Real time
Remote sensing
River channels
Satellite imagery
Satellite observation
Satellites
Shallow water
Tidal flats
Toolkits
Water levels
Wetlands
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Abstract Despite their global abundance and high ecological and socio-economic significance, the dynamics of coastal inlets often remain poorly quantified at multi-decadal time scales. Here, we introduce InletTracker, a new tool that reconstructs the time-evolving state of dynamic coastal inlets over the last 30+ years from publicly available Landsat 5, 7 and 8 and Sentinel 2 satellite imagery. InletTracker is a Google Earth Engine enabled python toolkit that uses a novel least cost pathfinding approach to trace inlets along and across the berm (i.e., barrier, bar), and then analyses the resulting transects to infer whether an inlet is open or closed. To evaluate the performance of InletTracker, we applied the tool at 12 intermittent coastal inlets with different maximum inlet widths (≤30-200m), geomorphological setting and opening frequency located across Southeastern and Southwestern Australia. This exercise involved 6363 unique binary inlet state predictions (i.e., open vs. closed) that were validated against visually inferred inlet states (from the satellite imagery itself), on-ground observational records, and in situ water levels from inside the inlets. InletTracker reproduced the visually inferred inlet states with an average accuracy across all sites of 89% for the combined Landsat and Sentinel 2 record (15-30m resolution) and 94% for the Sentinel 2 record only (10m resolution). Overall, we found good agreement between the predictions of the tool and the three independent validation datasets for all but the smallest sites. Our results demonstrate that InletTracker will enable coastal engineers, managers, and researchers to gain new insights into the dynamics and drivers of coastal inlets or similar shallow water landforms such as river mouths, tidal flats, floodplains, wetlands or delta channel networks. Further, the high spatial (i.e., 10m) and temporal (i.e., 5 daily) resolution provided by Sentinel 2 makes InletTracker a viable option for near real-time monitoring of even relatively small inlets with a minimum channel width of around 10m and frequent, short duration, openings.
AbstractList Despite their global abundance and high ecological and socio-economic significance, the dynamics of coastal inlets often remain poorly quantified at multi-decadal time scales. Here, we introduce InletTracker, a new tool that reconstructs the time-evolving state of dynamic coastal inlets over the last 30+ years from publicly available Landsat 5, 7 and 8 and Sentinel 2 satellite imagery. InletTracker is a Google Earth Engine enabled python toolkit that uses a novel least cost pathfinding approach to trace inlets along and across the berm (i.e., barrier, bar), and then analyses the resulting transects to infer whether an inlet is open or closed. To evaluate the performance of InletTracker, we applied the tool at 12 intermittent coastal inlets with different maximum inlet widths (≤30-200m), geomorphological setting and opening frequency located across Southeastern and Southwestern Australia. This exercise involved 6363 unique binary inlet state predictions (i.e., open vs. closed) that were validated against visually inferred inlet states (from the satellite imagery itself), on-ground observational records, and in situ water levels from inside the inlets. InletTracker reproduced the visually inferred inlet states with an average accuracy across all sites of 89% for the combined Landsat and Sentinel 2 record (15-30m resolution) and 94% for the Sentinel 2 record only (10m resolution). Overall, we found good agreement between the predictions of the tool and the three independent validation datasets for all but the smallest sites. Our results demonstrate that InletTracker will enable coastal engineers, managers, and researchers to gain new insights into the dynamics and drivers of coastal inlets or similar shallow water landforms such as river mouths, tidal flats, floodplains, wetlands or delta channel networks. Further, the high spatial (i.e., 10m) and temporal (i.e., 5 daily) resolution provided by Sentinel 2 makes InletTracker a viable option for near real-time monitoring of even relatively small inlets with a minimum channel width of around 10m and frequent, short duration, openings.
Author Fu, Wanru
Heimhuber, Valentin
Vos, Kilian
Glamore, William
Author_xml – sequence: 1
  givenname: Valentin
  surname: Heimhuber
  fullname: Heimhuber, Valentin
– sequence: 2
  givenname: Kilian
  surname: Vos
  fullname: Vos, Kilian
– sequence: 3
  givenname: Wanru
  surname: Fu
  fullname: Fu, Wanru
– sequence: 4
  givenname: William
  surname: Glamore
  fullname: Glamore, William
BookMark eNotjz9PwzAUxD3AAIUPwPYk5pTYcZyWrar4U6kSSGSvXpxnapr6Fdsd2PngpMB0J51-d7pLcRY4kBA3spzKslR3lBJjHH1dGj2vpvJCfK_CQLmNaHcU72ERgA8UisTHaAlev_KWA2TmYeczOI6w9Slz9BYw9BAII0TCoch-T7Dn4E9heAd2YBlTxgH8aSGBi7yH9UglzL_wG4XsAw2FuhLnDodE1_86Ee3jQ7t8LtYvT6vlYl0cGikLV1ndkyWjTN_16Iws5w6dM7omVWtqEHtXaUPaaZQ4o9640TXY2G5WdaqaiNu_2kPkzyOlvPkYb4ZxcaPqUs5nRtWq-gFMCWIh
ContentType Paper
Copyright 2021. This work is licensed under http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode (the “License”). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.
Copyright_xml – notice: 2021. This work is licensed under http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode (the “License”). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.
DBID 7ST
7TG
8FD
8FE
8FG
AAFGM
ABQRF
ABUWG
ADZZV
AEUYN
AFKRA
AFLLJ
AFOKG
AGAJT
AQTIP
ARAPS
AZQEC
BENPR
BGLVJ
C1K
CCPQU
DWQXO
H8D
HCIFZ
KL.
L7M
P5Z
P62
PHGZM
PHGZT
PIMPY
PKEHL
PQCXX
PQEST
PQGLB
PQQKQ
PQUKI
PRINS
SOI
SQOEQ
DOI 10.1002/essoar.10506493.1
DatabaseName Environment Abstracts
Meteorological & Geoastrophysical Abstracts
Technology Research Database
ProQuest SciTech Collection
ProQuest Technology Collection
ProQuest Central Korea - hybrid linking
Technology Collection - hybrid linking
ProQuest Central (Alumni)
ProQuest Central (Alumni) - hybrid linking
One Sustainability
ProQuest Central UK/Ireland
SciTech Premium Collection - hybrid linking
Advanced Technologies & Aerospace Collection - hybrid linking
ProQuest Central Essentials - hybrid linking
ProQuest Women's & Gender Studies - hybrid linking
Health Research Premium Collection
ProQuest Central Essentials - QC
ProQuest Central
Technology collection
Environmental Sciences and Pollution Management
ProQuest One Community College
ProQuest Central
Aerospace Database
SciTech Premium Collection
Meteorological & Geoastrophysical Abstracts - Academic
Advanced Technologies Database with Aerospace
Advanced Technologies & Aerospace Database
ProQuest Advanced Technologies & Aerospace Collection
Proquest Central Premium
ProQuest One Academic (New)
Publicly Available Content Database
ProQuest One Academic Middle East (New)
ProQuest Central - hybrid linking
ProQuest One Academic Eastern Edition (DO NOT USE)
ProQuest One Applied & Life Sciences
ProQuest One Academic (retired)
ProQuest One Academic UKI Edition
ProQuest Central China
Environment Abstracts
ProQuest One Sustainability - hybrid linking
DatabaseTitle Publicly Available Content Database
Technology Collection
Technology Research Database
ProQuest One Academic Middle East (New)
ProQuest Advanced Technologies & Aerospace Collection
ProQuest Central Essentials
ProQuest Central (Alumni Edition)
SciTech Premium Collection
ProQuest One Community College
ProQuest Central China
Environmental Sciences and Pollution Management
ProQuest Central
ProQuest One Applied & Life Sciences
Aerospace Database
ProQuest One Sustainability
Meteorological & Geoastrophysical Abstracts
ProQuest Central Korea
ProQuest Central (New)
Advanced Technologies Database with Aerospace
Advanced Technologies & Aerospace Collection
ProQuest One Academic Eastern Edition
ProQuest Technology Collection
ProQuest SciTech Collection
Advanced Technologies & Aerospace Database
ProQuest One Academic UKI Edition
ProQuest One Academic
Environment Abstracts
Meteorological & Geoastrophysical Abstracts - Academic
ProQuest One Academic (New)
DatabaseTitleList Publicly Available Content Database
Database_xml – sequence: 1
  dbid: PIMPY
  name: Publicly Available Content Database
  url: http://search.proquest.com/publiccontent
  sourceTypes: Aggregation Database
DeliveryMethod fulltext_linktorsrc
GroupedDBID 7ST
7TG
8FD
8FE
8FG
ABUWG
AEUYN
AFKRA
ARAPS
AZQEC
BENPR
BGLVJ
C1K
CCPQU
DWQXO
H8D
HCIFZ
KL.
L7M
P62
PHGZM
PHGZT
PIMPY
PKEHL
PQEST
PQGLB
PQQKQ
PQUKI
PRINS
SOI
ID FETCH-LOGICAL-p711-f3c4dece626dbdaf6109faff645e254e7aadf346e4f4a1a8ed6ff4a7a7cb83b23
IEDL.DBID P5Z
IngestDate Mon Jun 30 17:34:27 EDT 2025
IsDoiOpenAccess true
IsOpenAccess true
IsPeerReviewed false
IsScholarly false
Language English
LinkModel DirectLink
MergedId FETCHMERGED-LOGICAL-p711-f3c4dece626dbdaf6109faff645e254e7aadf346e4f4a1a8ed6ff4a7a7cb83b23
Notes ObjectType-Article-1
content type line 51
ObjectType-Feature-2
SourceType-Working Papers-1
OpenAccessLink https://www.proquest.com/docview/2501986252?pq-origsite=%requestingapplication%
PQID 2501986252
PQPubID 4882998
ParticipantIDs proquest_journals_2501986252
PublicationCentury 2000
PublicationDate 20210317
PublicationDateYYYYMMDD 2021-03-17
PublicationDate_xml – month: 03
  year: 2021
  text: 20210317
  day: 17
PublicationDecade 2020
PublicationPlace Washington
PublicationPlace_xml – name: Washington
PublicationTitle Earth and Space Science Open Archive ESSOAr
PublicationYear 2021
Publisher American Geophysical Union
Publisher_xml – name: American Geophysical Union
Score 1.6178278
Snippet Despite their global abundance and high ecological and socio-economic significance, the dynamics of coastal inlets often remain poorly quantified at...
SourceID proquest
SourceType Aggregation Database
SubjectTerms Coastal dynamics
Coastal engineering
Coastal inlets
Coastal management
Coastal zone management
Environmental monitoring
Floodplains
Geomorphology
Inlets
Landforms
Landsat
Landsat satellites
Monitoring
Open source software
Real time
Remote sensing
River channels
Satellite imagery
Satellite observation
Satellites
Shallow water
Tidal flats
Toolkits
Water levels
Wetlands
Title InletTracker: An open-source Python toolkit for historic and near real-time monitoring of coastal inlets from Landsat and Sentinel-2
URI https://www.proquest.com/docview/2501986252
hasFullText 1
inHoldings 1
isFullTextHit
isPrint
link http://cvtisr.summon.serialssolutions.com/2.0.0/link/0/eLvHCXMwpV1LS8NAEF609eBJRcVHLXvwujaPzaNeRMViQUvQHqqXMs3OYjEmtY2Cd3-4MzHFg-DFW5YQEmYzj29mdj4hjt0QQgAHlasjSwBFgwJLS0IXvtEedmM0FdlENBjEo1E3qRNui7qtcmkTK0NtipRz5B1y1YSPKVr3zmavilmjuLpaU2isiiZPSWDFTILHZfHS8TpkLQqYM5ktud6uf-L-MrmVH-lt_PcLNkUzgRnOt8QK5tvis5-T2MndcG_EqTzPJZNhqe-EvEw-eC6ALIsie56WkqJT-VQPBZGQG5nTTy4pZswUE8zLl0q7Oc0nCyvTAihuzOSU37CQfApF3vCxYCirh--5yyjHTHk7Yti7Gl5eq5pWQc0i11XWT7XBFAnJmIkBy_PWLVgb6gAJLWIEYKyvQ9RWgwu0V6GlqwiidBL7E8_fFY28yHFPSGfCZVvAyHFRh2kIAaAfaEAvNp61wb5oLSU5rlVjMf4R48Hftw_FuscNJNw8F7VEo5y_4ZFYS9_L6WLeFs2Lq0Fy1652nFZJ_zZ5-AJTob03
linkProvider ProQuest
linkToHtml http://cvtisr.summon.serialssolutions.com/2.0.0/link/0/eLvHCXMw1V1La9tAEF5MUmhObWhK855DetzEWq0kOxBKyIMYu8YQH0IvZqydJSa25Npqg-_9O_2PmZEtcgjklkNuEmLRDjM7j53Hp9RREGOMWCcd2MRzgGJRo-dXji5CZw01G-RKsImk223c3TV7NfW_6oWRsspKJ5aK2uWp3JGfsKnm-Ji9dfNj-lsLapRkVysIjaVYtGnxyCHb_Kx1yfz9bsz1Vf_iRq9QBfQ0CQLtw9Q6SokdeTd06GXcuEfvYxsRB0uUIDof2pistxggbzX2_JRgkg4b4VDmHLDGX7eWqeHj04t-VbnSujlh5ZTjTLBz2dI3w-PghYYvzdb1p3dG8Ge13sMpzTZVjbIv6l8rY6FiYyqVH6dwnoFAfellugF6C5l6AEWejx9GBbDvDferkSeAmYOMtw7sEY91MZoQTErdJZeYkHtIc2SveAwj-cMcpMcGOtL0jEW5-FZqqDIaa7Ol-m9B7Ve1luUZfVNQH0pSGimpB2TjNMYIKYwskmk44320rfYqxg1WB38-eObazuufD9XHm_7PzqDT6rZ31YaRUhkpE0z21Fox-0P76kP6txjNZwelkIEavDGPnwDJ7hr8
openUrl ctx_ver=Z39.88-2004&ctx_enc=info%3Aofi%2Fenc%3AUTF-8&rfr_id=info%3Asid%2Fsummon.serialssolutions.com&rft_val_fmt=info%3Aofi%2Ffmt%3Akev%3Amtx%3Ajournal&rft.genre=article&rft.atitle=InletTracker%3A+An+open-source+Python+toolkit+for+historic+and+near+real-time+monitoring+of+coastal+inlets+from+Landsat+and+Sentinel-2&rft.jtitle=Earth+and+Space+Science+Open+Archive+ESSOAr&rft.au=Heimhuber%2C+Valentin&rft.au=Vos%2C+Kilian&rft.au=Fu%2C+Wanru&rft.au=Glamore%2C+William&rft.date=2021-03-17&rft.pub=American+Geophysical+Union&rft_id=info:doi/10.1002%2Fessoar.10506493.1