The intensive research on sediment transport indicates a need of an appropriate equation for predicting the total sediment load in rivers to manage reservoirs, operate dam and design in-stream hydraulic structures. None of the available equations in sediment transport has gained universal acceptance for predicting the total sediment transport rate. These facts indicate the need of a general formula to represent all these formula for predicting the sediment transport rate. The first goal of this dissertation is to find a unified total sediment transport equation for all rivers. On the other hand, scour around hydraulic structures such as spur dikes and bridge piers can be a serious problem that weakens structural stability. An investigation on the turbulent flow field and turbulence distribution around such hydraulic structures is essential to understand the mechanism of local scour and to determine which turbulence properties affect the local sediment transport. In addition, a universal turbulent model that is valid for all cases of turbulent flow in open channels does not exist. This dissertation thoroughly examined the turbulent flow field and turbulence distribution around a series of three dikes. The goal is to determine the significant turbulent properties for predicting the local sediment transport rate and to identify the appropriate turbulence model for simulating turbulent flow field around the dikes.To develop a general unified total load equation, this study evaluates 31 commonly used formulae for predicting the total sediment load. This study attributes the deviations of calculated results from different formulae to the stochastic properties of bed shear stresses and assumes that the bed shear stress satisfies the log- normal distribution. At any given bed shear stress, Monte Carlo simulation is applied to each equation, and a set of bed shear stresses are randomly generated. Total sediment load generated from each Monte Carlo realization of all the equations are assembled to represent the samples of total sediment load predicted from all the equations. The statistical properties of the resultant total sediment loads (e.g. standard deviation, mean) at each given bed shear stress are calculated. Then, a unified total sediment load equation is obtained based on the mean value from all the equations. The results showed the mean of all the equations is a power function of dimensionless bed shear stress. Reasonable agreements with measurements demonstrate that the unified equation is more accurate than any individual equation for predicting the total sediment load.An experimental study and numerical simulation of the flow field and local scour around a series of spur dikes is performed in a fixed flat bed and scoured bed condition. A micro-Acoustic Doppler Velocimeter (ADV) is used to measure the instantaneous velocity field in all the three spatial directions and the measured velocity profiles are used to calculate the turbulence properties. Results show that the local scour develops around the first dike. Turbulence intensity together with the mean velocity in the vertical direction measured at the flat bed closely correlates to the scour depth. In addition, the maximum bed shear stress, occurring at the tip of the second dike in the three-dike series, does not correspond to the maximum scour. Large bed load transport due to bed shear stress may not initiate bed scouring, but turbulence bursts (e.g. sweeps and ejections) will entrain sediment from bed surface and develop the local scour.A three-dimensional numerical model FLOW-3D is used to simulate the turbulent flow field around a series of spur dikes in flat and scoured bed. This study examines Prandtl's mixing length model, one equation model, standard two-equation model, Renormalization-Group (RNG) model, and Large Eddy Simulations (LES) turbulence model. The Prandtl's mixing length model and one equation model are not applicable to flow field around dikes. Results of mean flow field by using the standard two-equation model, and RNG turbulence model are close to the experimental data, however the simulated turbulence properties from different turbulent model deviate considerably. The calculated results from different turbulence models show that the RNG model best predicts the mean flow field for this series of spur dikes. None of the turbulence closure models can predict accurate results of turbulence properties, such as turbulence kinetic energy. Based on those results, this study recommends the use of RNG model for simulating mean flow field around dikes. Further improvements of FLOW-3D model is needed for predicting turbulence properties near this series of spur dikes under various flow conditions.