The Atlantic Coastal Plain mainly consists of solely Long Island, the home of the most wonderful person in the world...the island that is really a sandbar. There is no underlying bedrock, as you can see in the map below (Figure 1.0001). It is made of unconsolidated gravels, sands, and clays - all from the Cretaceous, Tertiary, and Pleistocene (two periods and an epoch from the Quarternary period).
The Atlantic Coastal Plain is the result of glacial activity. The North Shore has several famous moraines, such as the Ronkonkoma Moraine (formed during the early part of the Wisconsin Stage of the Pleistocene Epoch) and the much younger Harbor Hill Moraine (the terminal moraine of the most recent and most southern-reaching glacier). The South Shore is the result of glacial outwash - the meltwater from the terminal moraines carrying gravel, sand, and rock flour to the edges of the continental shelf. |
