Rocko A. Brown

The Topographic Design of River Channels for Form-Process Linkages

Abstract Scientists and engineers design river topography for a wide variety of uses, such as experimentation, site remediation, dam mitigation, flood management, and river restoration. A recent advancement has been the notion of topographical design to yield specific fluvial mechanisms in conjunction with natural or environmental flow releases. For example, the flow convergence routing mechanism, whereby shear stress and spatially convergent flow migrate or jump from the topographic high (riffle) to the low point (pool) from low to high discharge, is thought to be a key process able to maintain undular relief in gravel bedded rivers. This paper develops an approach to creating riffle-pool topography with a form-process linkage to the flow convergence routing mechanism using an adjustable, quasi equilibrium synthetic channel model. The link from form to process is made through conceptualizing form-process relationships for riffle-pool couplets into geomorphic covariance structures (GCSs) that are then quantitatively embedded in a synthetic channel model. Herein, GCSs were used to parameterize a geometric model to create five straight, synthetic river channels with varying combinations of bed and width undulations. Shear stress and flow direction predictions from 2D hydrodynamic modeling were used to determine if scenarios recreated aspects of the flow convergence routing mechanism. Results show that the creation of riffle-pool couplets that experience flow convergence in straight channels requires GCSs with covarying bed and width undulations in their topography as supported in the literature. This shows that GCSs are a useful way to translate conceptualizations of form-process linkages into quantitative models of channel form.

Hierarchically nested river landform sequences. Part 1: Theory

Past river classifications use incommensurate typologies at each spatial scale and do not capture the pivotal role of topographic variability at each scale in driving the morphodynamics responsible for evolving hierarchically nested fluvial landforms. This study developed a new way to create geomorphic classifications using metrics diagnostic of individual processes the same way at every spatial scale and spanning a wide range of scales. We tested the approach on flow convergence routing, a geomorphically and ecologically important process with different morphodynamic states of erosion, routing, and deposition depending on the structure of nondimensional topographic variability. Five nondimensional landform types with unique functionality represent this process at any flow; they are nozzle, wide bar, normal channel, constricted pool, and oversized. These landforms are then nested within themselves by considering their longitudinal sequencing at key flows representing geomorphically important stages. A data analysis framework was developed to answer questions about the stage-dependent spatial structure of topographic variability. Nesting permutations constrain and reveal how flow convergence routing morphodynamics functions in any river the framework is applied to. The methodology may also be used with other physical and biological datasets to evaluate the extent to which the patterning in that data is influenced by flow convergence routing. Copyright