Virginia Coastal Resilience Collaborative: Free workshop in Williamsburg April 21
Tuesday, March 3, 2026/Categories: News Board
The Virginia Coastal Resilience Collaborative is hosting a free workshop on Tuesday, April 21 for a workshop discussing NOAA’s updates to geodetic vertical datums and tidal datums.
Vertical datums are the baseline standards from which we derive land elevation and marine-based measurements like mean low water, mean high water, and mean sea level. NOAA and the National Geodetic Survey are in the process of updating vertical and tidal datums. Several of these derived measurements are addressed in state a local government codes and ordinances.
This workshop will focus on a project funded by NOAA through the Virginia Coastal Zone Management Program, where references to tidal datums, vertical datums, and their derived measurements were catalogued and assessed for potential impacts from pending updates.
Topics will include background on datums and their use in state and local codes in Virginia; how the VCRC, VIMS, and CBNERR-VA approached this research and catalogued references; the results of an analysis of these changes on Virginia state and local laws; and discussion on possible ways to address these impacts.
The workshop will be held from 9:30am to 1:00pm at William & Mary’s School of Education at 301 Monticello Ave, Williamsburg, VA 23185. Registration is free and lunch will be provided. Following various presentations on aspects of the project and preliminary conclusions, ample time for discussion is built in to garner feedback on next steps and address questions. We encourage you to share this event with your networks, particularly state and local government officials and employees, and planning district commissions who will see the most impact from these updates.
REGISTRATION: You can use this link to register for the workshop.
FLYER: A PDF promotional flyer is available here >.
AGENDA: A PDF of the workshop agenda is available here and on the VCRC website.
Virginia Coastal Resilience Collaborative Contact: Thomas Ruppert, tkruppert@wm.edu