MPA_Inventory _Database

Frequently-anticipated questions:

What does this data set describe?

Title: MPA_Inventory _Database

Abstract:

The MPA Inventory is a comprehensive catalog that provides detailed information for existing marine protected areas in the United States. The inventory provides classification attributes that seek to define the conservation objectives, protection level, governance and related management criteria for all sites in the database. The comprehensive inventory of federal, state, and territorial MPA sites provides governments and stakeholders with access to information to make better decisions about the current and future use of place-based conservation. The information also will be used to inform the development of the national system of marine protected areas as required by Executive Order 13158.  This database is associated with the MPA_Inventory_GIS_Database which provides geospatial boundary data for many of these sites as it is available from contributing agencies.

  1. How should this data set be cited?

NOAA's Marine Protected Areas Center, March 2008, MPA_Inventory_Database.

  1. What geographic area does the data set cover?

West_Bounding_Coordinate: -180.000000

East_Bounding_Coordinate: 180.000000

North_Bounding_Coordinate: 70.329973

South_Bounding_Coordinate: -14.609461

  1. Does the data set describe conditions during a particular time period?

Calendar_Date: March 2008

Currentness_Reference: publication date

  1. How does the data set describe geographic features?

MPA_Inventory_GIS_Database

Site_Name

Name of the Site (Source: Governing Agency)

Gov_Level

Government Level - What level of government controls jurisdiction over the site and its holdings. (Source: Governing Agency)

SITE_NAME

GOV_LEVEL

SITE_ID

Identification given to each site for record keeping and data management (Source: MPAC)

PROTECT_SC

Scale of Protection

Value

Definition

ES

Ecosystem Scale

FS

Focal Scale

PROTECT_LE

Protection Level (Source: MPAC)

Value

Definition

NAL

No access MPAs restrict all human access in order to prevent potential ecological disturbance. Types of no access MPAs are those that protect marine animals during sensitive life stages, or serve as areas for research in the absence of any human activities

NIL

No Impact MPAs or zones that allow human access, but that prohibit all activities that could harm the site’s resources or disrupt the ecological or cultural services they provide.

NTL

No Take MPAs or zones that allow human access and even some potentially harmful uses, but that totally prohibit the extraction or significant destruction of natural or cultural resources.

UML

Uniform Multiple Use MPAs or zones with a consistent level of protection and allowable activities, including certain extractive uses, across the entire protected area.

ZML

Zoned Multiple Use MPAs that allow some extractive activities throughout the entire site, but that use marine zoning to allocate specific uses to compatible places or times in order to reduce user conflicts and adverse impacts.

ZNL

Zoned Multiple-Use With No-Take Area(s) are Multiple-use MPAs that contain at least one legally established management zone in which all resource extraction is prohibited.

CONSTANCY

Constancy of Protection

Value

Definition

YP

Year Round Protection

RP

Rotational Protection

SP

Seasonal Protection

CONSERV_FO

Conservation Focus

Value

Definition

CH

Cultural Heritage MPAs or zones established and managed wholly or in part to protect and understand submerged cultural resources that reflect the nation's maritime history and traditional cultural connections to the sea.

NH

Natural Heritage MPAs or zones established and managed wholly or in part to sustain, conserve, restore, and understand the protected area's natural biodiversity, populations, communities, habitats, and ecosystems; the ecological and physical processes upon which they depend; and, the ecological services, human uses and values they provide to this and future generations.

SP

Sustainable Production MPAs or zones established and managed wholly or in part with the explicit purpose of supporting the continued extraction of renewable living resources (such as fish, shellfish, plants, birds, or mammals) that live within the MPA, or that are exploited elsewhere but depend upon the protected area's habitat for essential aspects of their ecology or life history.

NHCH

Natural Heritage and Cultural Heritage

NHSP

Natural Heritage and Sustainable Production

PRIMARY_CF

Primary Conservation Focus

Value

Definition

NH

Natural Heritage MPAs or zones established and managed wholly or in part to sustain, conserve, restore, and understand the protected area's natural biodiversity, populations, communities, habitats, and ecosystems; the ecological and physical processes upon which they depend; and, the ecological services, human uses and values they provide to this and future generations.

CH

Cultural Heritage MPAs or zones established and managed wholly or in part to protect and understand submerged cultural resources that reflect the nation's maritime history and traditional cultural connections to the sea.

SP

Sustainable Production MPAs or zones established and managed wholly or in part with the explicit purpose of supporting the continued extraction of renewable living resources (such as fish, shellfish, plants, birds, or mammals) that live within the MPA, or that are exploited elsewhere but depend upon the protected area's habitat for essential aspects of their ecology or life history.

FISH_RESTR

Fishing Restrictions

Value

Definition

NoRstr

No Restrictions to Fishing

ProAll

All Fishing Prohibited

ProCom

Commercial Fishing Prohibited

ProRec

Recreational Fishing Prohibited

ResAll

All Fishing Restricted

ResCom

Commerical Fishing Restricted

ResRec

Recreational Fishing Restricted

UnRstr

Fishing Unrestricted

ESTABLISH_

Year Site was Established

PERMANENCE

Permanence of Protection

Value

Definition

PP

Permanent Protection

CP

Conditional Protection

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Who produced the data set?

  1. Who are the originators of the data set? (may include formal authors, digital compilers, and editors)
    • NOAA's Marine Protected Areas Center
  2. Who also contributed to the data set?

NOAA Marine Protected Areas Center in joint effort with the US Department of the Interior

  1. To whom should users address questions about the data?

GIS Manager
NOAA MPAC

MPAINVENTORY@NOAA.GOV

Why was the data set created?

The inventory represents a collection of data compiled from various federal, state, tribal and territorial entities to provide a publicly available source of comprehensive information on place-based marine conservation efforts under U.S. federal, state, territorial, local, and tribal jurisdiction.

How reliable are the data; what problems remain in the data set?

  1. How well have the observations been checked?
  2. How accurate are the geographic locations?
  3. How accurate are the heights or depths?
  4. Where are the gaps in the data? What is missing?

The inventory is complete as of March 2008. New and/or altered sites that are not currently present in the database will be added annually, as data are made available. Please note that site inclusion into the MPA inventory required that the site meet specific definition and conservation criteria that are thoroughly detailed on the www.mpa.gov website.

  1. How consistent are the relationships among the observations, including topology?

Inventory data were collected from various sources at various spatial scales. The datasets collected were not resampled and are presented in their original form as provided from the contributing agencies, with the exception for a variety of sites that were drawn from coordinates provided by governing agencies.

How can someone get a copy of the data set?

Are there legal restrictions on access or use of the data?

Access_Constraints:

These data are to be made publically accessible and downloadable via hyperlink on the WWW.

Use_Constraints:

The data are not to be used for navigation. For more information, see the accuracy section.

  1. Who distributes the data set? (Distributor 1 of 1)

MPAC GIS Manager

  1. What's the catalog number I need to order this data set?

Downloadable Data

  1. What legal disclaimers am I supposed to read?

The MPA Center shall not be held liable for improper or incorrect use of the data described and/or contained in this database. These data and related graphics are not legal documents and are not intended to be used as such. The information contained in these data is dynamic and may change over time. The data are not better than the original sources from which they were derived. It is the responsibility of the data user to use the data appropriately and within the limitations of geospatial data in general, and these data in particular.

Who wrote the metadata?

Dates:

Last modified: 06-May-2008

Metadata author:

NOAA Marine Protected Areas Center
c/o MPAC GIS Manager
99 Pacific Street, Suite 100G
Monterey., CA 93940

MPAINVENTORY@NOAA.GOV

Metadata standard:

FGDC Content Standards for Digital Geospatial Metadata (FGDC-STD-001-1998)

Metadata extensions used:

·         <http://www.esri.com/metadata/esriprof80.html>

Generated by mp version 2.8.6 on Tue May 06 10:32:32 2008