Rediscovering, Reevaluating, and Restoring Lost River-Wetland Corridors

River-wetland corridors form where a high degree of connectivity between the surface (rheic) and subsurface (hyporheic) components of streamflow creates an interconnected system of channels, wetlands, ponds, and lakes. River-wetland corridors occur where the valley floor is sufficiently wide to accommodate a laterally unconfined river planform that may feature morphologically complex, multi-threaded channels with vegetated bars, islands, and floodplains. River-wetland corridors can develop anywhere there is valley expansion along a drainage network, from the headwaters to estuaries or deltas, and they are found across all latitudes and within all biomes and hydroclimates. River-wetland corridors may be longitudinally continuous but are commonly interspersed with single-thread reaches in narrower portions of the valley. The development and persistence of river-wetland corridors is driven by combinations of geologic, biotic, and geomorphic processes that create a river environment that is diverse, heterogeneous, patchy, and dynamically stable, and within which patterns of flow, sediment features, and habitats shift continually. Hence, we describe these polydimensional river corridors as “kaleidoscope rivers.” Historically, river-wetland corridors were pervasive in wide, alluvial valley reaches, but their presence has been so diminished worldwide (due to a diverse range of anthropogenic activities and impacts) that the general public and even most river managers are unaware of their former pervasiveness. Here, we define river-wetland corridors as a river type; review paleoenvironmental and historical records to establish their past ubiquity; describe the geologic, biotic, and geomorphic processes responsible for their formation and persistence; and provide examples of river-wetland corridor remnants that still survive. We close by highlighting the significance of the diverse river functions supported by river-wetland corridors, the consequences of diminution and neglect of this river type, and the implications for river restoration.

Deriving Planform Morphology and Vegetation Coverage From Remote Sensing to Support River Management Applications

With the increasing availability of big geospatial data (e.g., multi-spectral satellite imagery) and access to platforms that support multi-temporal analyses (e.g., cloud-based computing, Geographical Information Systems, GIS), the use of remotely sensed information for monitoring riverine hydro-morpho-biodynamics is growing. Opportunities to map, quantify and detect changes in the wider riverscape (i.e., water, sediment and vegetation) at an unprecedented spatiotemporal resolution can support flood risk and river management applications. Focusing on a reach of the Po River (Italy), satellite imagery from Landsat 5, 7, and 8 for the period 1988–2018 were analyzed in Google Earth Engine (GEE) to investigate changes in river planform morphology and vegetation dynamics associated with transient hydrology. An improved understanding of these correlations can help in managing sediment transport and riparian vegetation to reduce flood risk, where biogeomorphic processes are commonly overlooked in flood risk mapping. In the study, two established indices were analyzed: the Modified Normalized Difference Water Index (MNDWI) for monitoring changes in the wetted river planform morphology, inferring information about sediment dynamics, and the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) for evaluating changes in vegetation coverage. Results suggest that planform changes are highly localized with most parts of the reach remaining stable. Using the wetted channel occurrence as a measure of planform stability, almost two-thirds of the wetted channel extent (total area = 86.4 km2) had an occurrence frequency >90% (indicating stability). A loss of planform complexity coincided with the position of former secondary channels, or zones where the active river channel had narrowed. Time series analysis of vegetation dynamics showed that NDVI maxima were recorded in May/June and coincided with the first peak in the hydrological regime (occurring in late spring and associated with snowmelt). Seasonal variation in vegetation coverage is potentially important for local hydrodynamics, influencing flood risk. We suggest that remotely sensed information can provide river scientists with new insights to support the management of highly anthropized watercourses.

Modeling groundwater-driven morphodynamic evolution of a gravel bed river in presence of riparian vegetation

<p>The morphological trajectory of gravel bed rivers is often dictated by the interaction between riparian vegetation, flow and sediment transport. Vegetation encroachment on riverbed can significantly reduce channel mobility, preventing bank erosion and ultimately confining the river to a single-thread planform. The rate at which plants can encroach the riverbed has been mainly associated to the frequency and magnitude of flooding removing vegetation. However, recent observations indicate that the groundwater dynamics can drive distinct morphological patterns, because of its effect on the spatial distribution of vegetation and growth. However, the quantification of the processes that links groundwater to river morphological changes through vegetation remains unclear.</p><p>Here we aim at investigating the ecomorphodynamics of a gravel bed river induced by spatial variations in vegetation density by means of numerical simulations. Our case study is a 3 km long reach of the Allondon river, Switzerland, characterized by a wandering river morphology and that underwent spatially contrasting river planform changes in the last decades. Field observations suggest that deep groundwater in the upper part of the reach limited vegetation growth over years, with the main channel keeping a larger active width and dynamic behavior. On the other hand, a shallower groundwater in the downstream part provided accessible water resources for plants, which encroached the riverbed and confined the channel into a single-thread type of morphology. We performed numerical simulations with the 2D shallow water model BASEMENT, considering a mobile bed composed by uniform sediment and including the main feedbacks between vegetation growth and erosion, the flow field, and the sediment transport processes. We set up the model parameters to reproduce different vegetation spatial distributions, associated with different groundwater depths, and investigated the effect of a 10-years return period flood on the river planform change.</p><p>Model results highlight that a low vegetation biomass density, particularly at lower riverbed elevations, caused no significant effect on scour and deposition processes, favoring channel mobility and plant removal by uprooting. This behavior is in line with the observations in the groundwater-deep part of the reach. In contrast, the occurrence of high biomass density at low elevations reduced significantly the channel mobility and the river active width. In this case, vegetation was able to trigger sedimentation on bars and reduce scouring in the main channel, which are key processes for the formation of vegetated, stable riverbeds.</p><p>This study represents a step forward to the understanding of the role of the complex link between vegetation dynamics and gravel bed rivers morphodynamics and shows the potential of ecomorphodynamic modeling to interpret river morphological trajectories.</p><p> </p><p> </p>

National-scale assessment of river migration at critical bridge infrastructure in the Philippines using Google Earth Engine

<p>River migration represents a geomorphic hazard at sites of critical bridge infrastructure, particularly in rivers where migration rates are high, as in the tropics. In the Philippines, where exposure to flooding and geomorphic risk are considerable, the recent expansion of infrastructural developments warrants quantification of river migration in the vicinity of bridge assets. We analysed publicly available bridge inventory data from the Philippines Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) and leveraged freely available satellite imagery in Google Earth Engine (GEE) to assess river migration. Specifically, we extracted active river channel masks of the bankfull extent (including the wetted channel and unvegetated, alluvial deposits) from Landsat products (Landsat 5, 7 and 8) using multi-spectral indices, before identifying river planform adjustments over decadal and engineering (30-year) timescales. For 74 bridges, we calculated similarity coefficients (Jaccard index) to indicate planform (dis)similarity and quantified changes in river channel width using RivWidthCloud.</p><p>Monitoring revealed the diversity of river planform adjustment at bridges in the Philippines (including channel migration, contraction, expansion and avulsion). The mean Jaccard index over decadal (0.65) and engineering (0.50) timescales indicated considerable planform adjustment throughout the national-scale inventory. However, planform adjustment and morphological behaviour varied between bridges. Some inventoried bridges were characterised by substantial planform adjustment and river migration, with maximum active channel contraction and expansion over decadal timescales equal to approximately 25% of the active channel width. This represents considerable lateral adjustment and when left unmanaged could pose a substantial geomorphic hazard. However, for other inventoried bridges the planform remained approximately stable and changes in channel width were limited. We suggest that multi-temporal analysis from satellite remote sensing offers a low-cost approach for monitoring the relative risk of river migration at critical bridge infrastructure; the approach can be extended to include other critical infrastructure adjacent to rivers (e.g., road, rail pipelines) and extended elsewhere to other dynamic riverine settings.</p>

Measuring river planform changes from remotely sensed data – a Monte Carlo approach to assessing the impact of spatially variable error

Remotely sensed data from fluvial systems are extensively used to document historical planform changes. However, geometric and delineation errors inherently associated with these data can result in poor or even misleading interpretation of measured changes, especially rates of channel lateral migration. It is thus imperative to take into account a spatially variable (SV) error affecting the remotely sensed data. In the wake of recent key studies using this SV error as a level of detection, we introduce a new framework to evaluate the significance of measured channel migration. Going beyond linear metrics (i.e. migration vectors between diachronic river centrelines), we assess significance through a channel polygon method yielding a surficial metric (i.e. quantification of eroded, deposited, or eroded-then-deposited surfaces). Our study area is a mid-sized active wandering river: the lower Bruche, a ∼20 m wide tributary of the Rhine in eastern France. Within our four test sub-reaches, the active channel is digitised using diachronic orthophotos (1950 and 1964), and the SV error affecting the data is interpolated with an inverse-distance weighting (IDW) technique. The novelty of our approach arises from then running Monte Carlo (MC) simulations to randomly translate active channels and propagate geometric and delineation errors according to the SV error. This eventually leads to the computation of percentage of uncertainties associated with each of the measured planform changes, which allows us to evaluate the significance of the planform changes. In the lower Bruche, the uncertainty associated with the documented changes ranges from 15.8 % to 52.9 %. Our results show that (i) orthophotos are affected by a significant SV error; (ii) the latter strongly affects the uncertainty of measured changes; and (iii) the significance of changes is dependent on both the magnitude and the shape of the surficial changes. Taking the SV error into account is strongly recommended even in orthorectified aerial photos, especially in the case of mid-sized rivers (<30 m width) and/or low-amplitude river planform changes (<1 m2m-1yr-1). In addition to allowing detection of low-magnitude planform changes, our approach is also transferable as we use well-established tools (IDW and MC): this opens new perspectives in the fluvial context (e.g. multi-thread river channels) for robustly assessing surficial channel changes.