IMPLEMENTATION OF SURFICIAL MAPPING STANDARDS (SMS) AND GEOLOGIC MAPPING SCHEMA (GEMS) AT THE NEW YORK STATE GEOLOGICAL SURVEY: COMBINING EFFORTS FOR EFFECTIVE MAPPING

Beginning in 1990s, the New York State Museum – Geological Survey (NYSM-GS) initiated stratigraphic and surface materials mapping projects across New York State with funding through the newly created National Cooperative Geologic Mapping – StateMap and later Great Lakes Geological Mapping Coalition programs of the United States Geological Survey (USGS). The early years of this program utilized outside geologists and few geological survey mappers. In the late 2000s, Geological Survey staff began to conduct most of the funded projects. Each geologist at this time mapped utilizing their own methods and standards, and the differences between the resulting deliverables caused confusion for later compilation efforts. With the transition to entirely Geological Survey staff on these mapping projects, a need for a set of standards became apparent.

In 2019, the first set of Surficial Mapping Standards (SMS) was created in lockstep with the newly-completed Geologic Mapping Schema (GeMS) implemented by the USGS. These combined standards set the requirements from creating the field map to the published map in terms of both digital and archival data. They implemented minimum sampling requirements per quadrangle, a suite of consistent sediment descriptors, and elucidated location and textural data needed at every sampling stop. In addition, they set into place labelling procedures necessary for data tracking, cartography and cataloguing of samples taken for geochronology and textural analysis in the project area.

During the summer of 2023, mapping began in the Port Leyden 7.5-Minute Quadrangle within the Tug Hill Plateau/Western Adirondack Mountains regions of New York State. This project is the beginning of the first county-wide project to fully utilized the combined standards from the beginning. Due to these standards, mapping concluded with 336 total stops, including 94 samples for grain-size textural analysis. The main goal of the mapping projects is to delineate the extent, type, and age of deposition for sediments throughout the county and its surrounding region. Optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) dating of sand deposits and AMS radiocarbon dating on organics collected during field mapping and from soil cores will be used to bracket the timing of glacial events during the Pleistocene Epoch.