Higher-Dimensional Moving Averages and Submanifold Genericity

We generalize results of Jones and Olsen on multi-parameter moving ergodic averages to measure-preserving actions of $\mathbb R^d$ for $d\geq 1$. In particular, we give necessary and sufficient conditions for the pointwise convergence of averages over families of boxes in $\mathbb R^d$. As an application of our characterization, we show that averages along dilates of "locally flat" submanifolds in $\mathbb R^d$ do not necessarily converge point-wise for bounded measurable functions. This is closely related to the concept of submanifold-genericity recently introduced in \cite{BFK25}.