Late Paleozoic transcurrent tectonic assembly of the central Appalachian Piedmont

Abstract

Recent investigations in south‐eastern Pennsylvania and northern Maryland have demonstrated a major anastomosing strike‐slip shear system. The Pleasant Grove‐Huntingdon Valley shear system emerges from beneath the coastal plain cover at Trenton, New Jersey, and extends to the area west of Baltimore, Maryland, where it is overlain by the Culpepper Mesozoic rift basin. The sense of offset across this system is dextral. In the Susquehanna River region and north of the shear zone, the rocks of the Octoraro Formation contain evidence for two metamorphisms and deformations prior to strike‐slip shearing, whereas south of the shear zone the Peters Creek Formation contains evidence for only one. The discordance in metamorphic and deformational history across the shear zone suggests the now juxtaposed rocks originated in different parts of the orogen. Although conclusive ages for the strike‐slip deformation do not exist at this time, the timing of deformation is loosely constrained where the shear system crosscuts known Taconian structures in the Piedmont. Comparison of deformation style with other regions in the Appalachian suggests the Pleasant Grove‐Huntingdon Valley shear system is related to Alleghanian transcurrent tectonics in the Piedmont. Palinspastic reconstruction of the Pleasant Grove‐Huntingdon Valley shear system reveals fundamental problems in current tectonic models for the central Appalachian Piedmont. A minimum of 150 km of dextral offset is proposed for the Pleasant Grove‐Huntingdon Valley shear system based on reconstruction of the Cambrian‐Ordovician shelf edge between northern Maryland and southeastern New York. Displacement of this magnitude can account for the previously proposed tectonic models that portray a failed Iapetan rift block and microcontinent that contains the Baltimore Grenvillian massifs. Even though a history of early orthogonal collision is preserved within discrete structural blocks, transcurrent shearing has greatly influenced the distribution of those blocks. Models not including the strike‐slip component of tectonic assembly need serious reconsideration, as evidence grows that the magnitude of orogen‐parallel displacement is equal to or larger than the orthogonal component.