Tectonics-Related Geosites: Towards Accurate Nomenclature

Abstract

Accurate nomenclature of geological heritage sites (geosites) is necessary to facilitate their description and territorial geodiversity evaluation (both important for sustainable development and efficient land-use planning). As suggested by previous geological heritage studies, tectonics-related geosites are termed differently and, chiefly, provisionally (e.g., as tectonic geosites or structural geosites). Moreover, the nomenclature should take into account modern advances in the understanding of some basic tectonic phenomena. We propose abandoning the separation of structural, neotectonic, and seismic types of geosites and replacing with a single tectonic type. This can be further subdivided into subtypes, although one should consider the complexities in the links between tectonic and other geological phenomena (e.g., unique seismic features are essentially tectonic, but these can be expressed via geomorphological or sedimentary features—a geosite retains tectonic and geomorphological/sedimentary types in this case). The development of accurate nomenclature of tectonics-related geosites requires debates by experts in geological heritage.