how physical features of the coastal areas are beneficial to its inhabitants.
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In western South America, a large coastal plain lies between the Andes Mountains and the Pacific Ocean. In the United States, coastal plains can be found along the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico.
Coastal plains can form in two basic ways. Some start as a continental shelf, a flat piece of land located below sea level. When the ocean level falls, the land is exposed, creating a coastal plain. Sometimes, these coastal plains can extend far inland. Fossils of marine organisms have been found in the landlocked U.S. state of Kansas, for instance. Kansas was part of a vast coastal plain that formed when the Western Interior Seaway was forced to the Gulf of Mexico about 100 million years ago. The Western Interior Seaway was a large sea that split the continent of North America from what is now the Gulf of Mexico to the Arctic Ocean during the Cretaceous period.
A coastal plain can also develop when river currents carry rock, soil and other sedimentary material into the ocean. Layers of this deposited sediment build up over time, creating a flat or gently sloping landscape.
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National Geographic Kids: Arctic Coastal Tundra
USGS: A Tapestry of Time and Terrain—The Coastal Plain
NOAA: Coastal Plain Estuaries
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Throughout history, people have settled on coasts to take advantage of the amenities the oceans offer – a food supply, a source of transport, a defensible position and a healthy location. However, as coastal cities grow, they become detached from their environmental surroundings, while still requiring services from their local ecosystem. The demands placed on the host ecosystem threaten the viability of the cities themselves. Today, it is estimated that almost 50 per cent of the world’s coasts are threatened by development-related activities. Municipal, industrial and agricultural wastes and run-off, as well as atmospheric deposition, affect the most productive areas of the marine environment, including estuaries and near-shore coastal waters. Physical alterations to the coastal zone also threaten the marine environment.
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