An Updated Vs30 Map for California with Geologic and Topographic Constraints

This data release provides a map of the time-averaged shear-wave velocity in the upper 30 m (Vs30) for California using the method described by Thompson and others (2014). There are two adjustments to the algorithm described by Thompson and others (2014), which is built on the geology-based Vs30 map by Wills and Clahan (2006). In this data release, we use the Wills and others (2015) updated geology-based Vs30 map. The second change is that we have adjusted the kriging procedure so that measured Vs30 values do not affect the predictions across distinctly different geologic units.

Data and Resources

Field Value
accessLevel public
bureauCode {010:12}
catalog_@context https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
catalog_conformsTo https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
catalog_describedBy https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
datagov_dedupe_retained 20220721212438
identifier USGS:5a5fa029e4b06e28e9bfc43a
metadata_type geospatial
modified 20200818
old-spatial {"type": "Polygon", "coordinates": [[[-124.501041667, 32.498958335], [-124.501041667, 42.101041667], [ -114.098958335, 42.101041667], [ -114.098958335, 32.498958335], [-124.501041667, 32.498958335]]]}
publisher U.S. Geological Survey
publisher_hierarchy Department of the Interior > U.S. Geological Survey
resource-type Dataset
source_datajson_identifier true
source_hash 1cfa65e46e59211c7ea063578748fdb23fde4ca3
source_schema_version 1.1
spatial {"type": "Polygon", "coordinates": [[[-124.501041667, 32.498958335], [-124.501041667, 42.101041667], [ -114.098958335, 42.101041667], [ -114.098958335, 32.498958335], [-124.501041667, 32.498958335]]]}
theme {geospatial}
Groups
  • AmeriGEOSS
  • National Provider
  • North America
Tags
  • amerigeo
  • amerigeoss
  • california
  • ckan
  • earth-science
  • earthquake-hazard
  • earthquake-hazards-program
  • geo
  • geologic-hazards-science-center
  • geophysics
  • geoss
  • ghsc
  • national
  • north-america
  • seismic-hazard
  • seismology
  • tectonic
  • united-states
  • usgs
  • usgs-5a5fa029e4b06e28e9bfc43a
isopen False
license_id notspecified
license_title License not specified
maintainer Eric M Thompson
maintainer_email emthompson@usgs.gov
metadata_created 2025-11-23T00:01:51.912017
metadata_modified 2025-11-23T00:01:51.912022
notes This data release provides a map of the time-averaged shear-wave velocity in the upper 30 m (Vs30) for California using the method described by Thompson and others (2014). There are two adjustments to the algorithm described by Thompson and others (2014), which is built on the geology-based Vs30 map by Wills and Clahan (2006). In this data release, we use the Wills and others (2015) updated geology-based Vs30 map. The second change is that we have adjusted the kriging procedure so that measured Vs30 values do not affect the predictions across distinctly different geologic units.
num_resources 2
num_tags 20
title An Updated Vs30 Map for California with Geologic and Topographic Constraints