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The State of Florida has 1,350 miles of coastline that will be reshaped by sea-level rise during the next century. By year 2100, mean sea level is projected to be from 20 to 98 inches above levels measured in 1992. Tropical storms and hurricanes have also become more intense in the past twenty years and are likely to remain intense as the climate warms. Sea-level rise and consequential flooding threaten public roads, and addressing this threat requires a clear understanding of who is responsible for public road maintenance, and determination of risk related to what happens when road maintenance becomes locally infeasible due to environmental conditions and finances. This white paper begins by describing the jurisdiction and authority over public roads in Florida, and then it identifies the maintenance duties for each governmental entity that manages these roadways: state, county, and municipality. This white paper then discusses the elements of a negligence lawsuit and a nuisance claim, both of which could arise from the duty to maintain or repair roads. Next, this white paper explains the governmental power and possibility of raising sovereign immunity as a legal shield for defense in liability claims. Finally, this white paper discusses how a governmental entity could abandon a road to avoid maintenance responsibilities and the real potential of subsequent takings lawsuits that may follow.

The University of Florida GeoPlan Center has been organizing, standardizing, and distributing geospatial data since 1998 through the Florida Geographic Data Library (FGDL), a collection of Florida geospatial data from various agencies, as well as data developed in-house. With funding from the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT), FGDL serves as a public distribution mechanism for hundreds of Florida geospatial data layers. Since 2004, FGDL layers have formed the data foundation for FDOT's interagency application known as efficient transportation decision making (ETDM), which facilitates the review and permitting process for proposed transportation projects. Data layers are standardized and inspected to ensure that the data are adequate for use in analysis and decision making. To efficiently manage the geospatial data and workflows, a quality assurance/quality control (QAQC) process and relational database schema was developed to track the standardization procedures, lineage, versioning, and archivi...