Dans le contexte international de requalification des fronts d’eau urbains amorcé dans les années 1960, les espaces fluvio-urbains rhodaniens apparaissent comme singuliers. Malgré le discours des édiles locaux et un potentiel urbanistique certain, les rives urbanisées du Rhône à l’aval de Lyon ne font pas l’objet d’aménagements contemporains d’envergure. Le patrimoine urbain des rives rhodaniennes est figé ou délaissé, jusqu’à tomber parfois en déshérence. Cet immobilisme rivulaire reflète le paradoxe rhodanien de l'atonie de villes installées sur les rives d’un fleuve majestueux et profondément aménagé. Il démontre aussi que la reconquête des waterfronts n’est pas un processus systématique ni universel.La marginalisation de ces rives s’explique par la conjonction de facteurs relevant à la fois de l’hydrosystème et du sociosystème. L’hydrologie rhodanienne agit comme une contrainte sur les espaces fluvio-urbains qui sont aussi pénalisés par les dysfonctionnements d’un jeu d’acteurs lacunaire et par la pesanteur des infrastructures routières installées sur les berges. Ces éléments s’insèrent dans un cadre administratif et réglementaire complexe qui est une entrave supplémentaire à la recomposition des rives urbaines. Les faiblesses de la gestion de ces espaces s’accompagnent d’un défaut de prise en charge du risque d’inondation : les villes peinent à adopter des politiques de prévention en raison de la variabilité spécifique du risque rhodanien et de l’inertie propre au système des acteurs urbains. Cependant, le risque, en devenant objet politique, s’affirme comme un élément moteur participant à l’aménagement global du territoire rhodanien. La mise en place du « Plan Rhône », projet intégré de développement durable visant la gestion concertée du risque à l’échelle du bassin, constitue le point de départ d’un renouvellement territorial. Les villes en sont encore pour l’instant tenues à l’écart. / The urban river spaces in the lower Rhône valley are a special case in the international waterfront redevelopment process that began during the sixties. There has been no significant restructuring of Rhône riverfronts downstream of Lyon in spite of their urbanistic potential and the wishes expressed by some local authorities. The urban heritage of the Rhône riverbanks is ossified or neglected and sometimes completely abandoned. This lack of action concerning the waterfronts reflects the paradoxical situation concerning the Rhône valley: a combination of inert towns and an imposing river that has been highly developed. It also shows that waterfront redevelopment is neither a systematic nor a universal process.The marginalization of these river-banks is due to factors related to both the hydrosystem and the social system. The hydrology of the river acts as a constraint on urban planning, and the Rhône riverfronts also suffer from problems caused by deficiencies in the various bodies involved and from the heavy road infrastructures built on the river-banks. A complex administrative and legislative framework further hampers the urban redevelopment of the river spaces.Poor management of these riverfront spaces combines with failures in flood risk policies. Cities struggle to apply safety politics because the Rhône presents a specific and changing risk and because of the passivity of the urban actors. However, as the risk has become a political issue, it has turned out to be a driving force behind the development of the Rhône riverbank area. An integrated sustainable development project named “Plan Rhône” aims at coordinating risk management in the whole of the river basin, and is the first step in territorial renewal. The towns are not yet involved in this project.

No description available.

Volcanic tuffs and tuffaceous sediments are frequently associated with elevated As groundwater concentrations even though their bulk As contents (~ 5 mg kg-1; Savoie, 2013) are only marginally greater than the average crustal abundance of 4.8 mg g-1 (Rudnick & Gao, 2003). Thus, As mobilization must be facilitated by conditions particular to these rocks. Alkaline desorption, anionic competition, reactive glass dissolution, and reductive dissolution of iron oxides are proposed processes of As release from volcanic rocks. Geogenic As contamination of groundwater in the southern Willamette Valley in western Oregon has been well-documented since the early 1960s, and previous studies have identified the Little Butte Volcanics Series and Fisher and Eugene Formations as the source of As contamination. This study examines 19 samples from 10 units of ash flow tuffs and tuffaceous sediments within the Fisher Formation and Little Butte Volcanics Series, representing a range of weathering and devitrification, to determine conditions of mobilization and mineralogical constraints that control As release into solution. Leachate studies were conducted over a range of pH from 7 to 11, phosphate concentrations from 10 μM to 100 mM, and in time series from 4 to 196 hours. Results demonstrate that silicic volcanic tuffs are capable of mobilizing As in concentrations above regulatory limits at pH conditions produced naturally by the tuffs (pH 8-9) or with moderate concentrations of P (10-100 μM). Alteration products, e.g. zeolites and clays, appear to be the primary host phases for mobile As. Samples that do not contain these alteration products tend to produce concentrations of As well below regulatory limits and often below the instrument detection limits of this study. The type of alteration may influence As mobilization: tuffs containing more clays tend to mobilize As through surficial desorption, and tuffs containing more zeolites tend to mobilize As by dissolution or formation of colloids. Additionally, one volcaniclastic sample demonstrates that extremely elevated concentrations of As, up to 1000 μg/L are possible as a result of oxidative dissolution of As-bearing sulfide phases.

This research has utilised the Massachusetts Institute of Technology gen- eral circulation model (MITgcm) along with observations taken as part of the River In uences on Shelf Ecosystems (RISE) study to investigate the dynamic processes associated with the Columbia River plume at different temporal and spatial scales. Firstly, a high resolution ( x= y=25 m) investigation of the near-field plume was undertaken using the fully non-hydrostatic mode of the MITgcm. This resulted in the reproduction of a detailed inner plume as well as a series of radiated internal waves. In addition to first mode internal waves, second order waves were radiated from the plume boundary when propagation ve- locity becomes sub-critical. Third mode internal waves were also observed, trapped at the plume head. The fine plume structure produced revealed sec- ondary fronts within the plume that also generated internal waves. These features increase the mixing occurring inside the plume, resulting in greater entrainment of underlying waters into the plume. The use of Lagrangian drifters within the model produced detailed results of the recirculation tak- ing place within the emerging plume and how this recirculation changes with depth. This has implications for the near-field recirculation of biologically important solutes present in the plume waters. A second coarser resolution horizontal grid ( x= y=500 m) was imple- mented to investigate the processes of the large-scale plume with the addi- tion of wind forcing. Experiments with both simplified and realistic wind scenarios were carried out and comparisons with in-situ data were made. This revealed the dominance of wind effects on the outer plume and tidal effects on the inner plume. In the simplified wind cases, the classical the- ory of plume propagation under the action of upwelling and downwelling favourable winds was recreated. For the case of realistic winds, there was some success in reproducing a hindcast of the plume location. Tracer fields were used to represent nutrient concentrations based on observed data. Whilst these results showed variations from observations, they did allow a spatially and temporally complete view to be taken of nutrient distribu- tion in the region.

This thesis examines the history of Jefferson, Marion County, Texas, and its cycle of prosperity and decline.

The Leon River, a small-medium river in central Texas, is highly impacted by multiple impoundments, enrichment from agricultural runoff, and decreased dissolved oxygen levels. This degraded river contains sixteen unionid species, two of which are both endemic to the region and candidates for the federal endangered species listing (Quadrula houstonensis and Truncilla macrodon). While there is a short historical record for this river basin and a recent modern survey completed in 2011, zooarchaeological data adds evidence for conservation efforts by increasing the time depth of data available and providing another conservation baseline. Zooarchaeological data for the Leon River is available from the two Late Holocene archaeological sites: 41HM61 and the Belton Lake Assemblages. Data generated from these assemblages describe the prehistoric freshwater mussel community of the Leon River in terms of taxonomic composition and structure. By comparing this zooarchaeological data to the data generated by the longitudinal modern survey of the Leon River, long term changes within the freshwater mussel community can be detected. A conceptual model is constructed to evaluate how robusticity, identifiability, and life history ecology affect unionid taxonomic abundances in zooarchaeological data. This conceptual model functions as an interpretive tool for zooarchaeologists to evaluate forms of equifinality in zooarchaeological assemblages. This thesis determines differences between the late Holocene and modern freshwater community of the Leon River, explores how different alternative mechanisms influence zooarchaeological data, and exemplifies of how zooarchaeological data can be used for conservation biology.

A three part investigation into the effects of riparian reforestation on small streams demonstrated the timing, nature, and processes of morphologic change. First, measurements of two small streams in northeastern Vermont collected in 1966 and 2004 – 2005 documented considerable change in channel width following a period of passive reforestation. Channel widths of several tributaries to Sleepers River were measured in 1966 when the area had more non-forested riparian vegetation than today. A longitudinal survey in 2004 of two of these tributaries, followed by detailed measurements at specific reaches in 2005, provided information on channel size, large woody debris (LWD), and riparian vegetation. Reforested reaches have widened and incised markedly since 1966. Reaches with the oldest forest were widest for a given drainage area, and the non-forested reaches were substantially narrower. A conceptual model was developed that describes a multi-phase process of incision, widening, and recovery following riparian reforestation of non-forested areas. Second, a fixed-bed hydraulic model of one of the streams was developed to evaluate the impact of forested riparian vegetation on near-bank turbulence during overbank flows. Flume experiments with kinematic similitude and a 1:5 scale represented half a channel and its floodplain, mimicking the size of a non-forested reach. Two types of vegetation were simulated: non-forested, with synthetic grass carpet; and forested, where wooden dowels were added. Three-dimensional velocities were measured with an acoustic Doppler velocimeter. Velocities, turbulent kinetic energy (TKE), and Reynolds shear stress showed significant differences between forested and non-forested runs. Forested runs exhibited a narrow band of high TKE in the near-bank region that was roughly two times greater than in non-forested runs. Hydraulic characteristics of forested runs appear to create an environment with higher erosion potential, thereby indicating a possible driving mechanism for channel widening in reforesting stream reaches. Third, Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) data from Chittenden County were analyzed to develop a method capable of classifying riparian buffers into broad classes according to forest type and age. The geospatial characteristics of the LiDAR data in forested areas were explored using semivariogram analysis, and LiDAR-based metrics were derived in a geographic information system (GIS) to quantify vegetation height and variance. The LiDAR-based metrics were then used in two discriminant analysis procedures that distinguished: 1) forest type as deciduous or coniferous; and 2) forest age in four age classes. With the resulting linear discriminant functions, a GIS-based classification method was developed. The classification method was highly successful at determining forest type but only moderately successful at determining forest age.

The bedload transport of mixed size sediment is an important process in river engineering. Bedload transport controls channel stability and has a significant bearing on the hydraulic roughness of the channel. The prediction of bedload transport traditionally relies upon defining some critical value of fluid force above which particles of a particular diameter are assumed to be put into transport. The suggestion here is that the transport of bed material is size dependent with large grains being more difficult to remove from the bed surface than small grains and that all grains of the same size start to move under identical conditions. While it is relatively straightforward to assess the forces required to engender transport in a bed of uniform size grains, it is not so simple where there are a number of different grain sizes present. Multitudinous experimental studies have revealed that where there are a number of grain sizes present, large grains tend to become mobilised under lower fluid forces and small grains mobilised under higher fluid forces than those required for beds of uniform material. These results led to the development of so-called hiding functions which are used to model the variation of particle mobility with its relative size within the mixture. These functions derive their name from the tendency of large grains to shelter smaller grains from the action of the flow. Determining the relative mobility of each fraction in a mixture under given hydraulic conditions is the key to predicting how the composition of the bed load will relate to that of the bed surface material. Experiments were carried out in a rectangular, glass sided channel, in a sediment recirculation mode, under varying hydraulic conditions with a set of six different sediment mixtures. Laser Doppler Anemometry (LDA) was used to attain instantaneous velocity measurements at a number of locations in the flow. A Laser Displacement Meter was used to measure the detailed topography of small sections of the bed surface. Novel analysis techniques facilitated the determination of the grain size distribution of the bed surface by a grid-by-number method. The minimum force required to entrain each grain could also be estimated by a grain pivoting analysis. This information represents the resistance of the bed grains to erosion by flowing water. With the critical conditions for the bed grains known, it is possible to estimate the proportion of each fraction entrained from the bed surface under given hydraulic conditions. To estimate the bedload composition it is first necessary to scale by the proportion each size comprises on the bed surface and then, by a function of grain diameter to account for size dependency of travel velocity. For mean hydraulic conditions the proportion of the bed mobilised can be simply determined by inspection of a cumulative distribution of critical conditions. In reality, although it may be possible to entrain some grains at the mean velocity/shear stress, the majority of transport may be anticipated to occur during high magnitude events. Turbulence may be incorporated by adopting a probabilistic approach to the prediction of grain entrainment. By considering the joint probability distribution of bed shear stress and critical shear stress, one may attain the probability of grain entrainment. Comparison of the probability of erosion of each fraction facilitates a prediction of the bedload composition. Results show that the probabilistic approach provides a significant improvement over deterministic methods for the prediction of bedload composition.

The community of Black River First Nation located along the shores of Lake Winnipeg in eastern Manitoba began as a seasonal Anishinaabe fishing village, and became a permanent settlement upon entering into Treaty in 1876. A renewed interest within the community to preserve traditional knowledge and remain connected to the past led to my involvement with the community. Upon learning of a historic settlement site once connected by an extensive water and land based transportation network, design decisions were made to reintegrate this network into the community. This practicum explores how a change in settlement location has impacted community development and proposes a design strategy for the historic Black River settlement site that creates destinations and travel routes to enhance and rediscover connections to the lands and waters that shaped the community. / May 2016

Creation of accurate and coherent surface models is vital to the effective planning and construction of flood control and hurricane protection projects. Typically, topographic surface models are synthesized from Delaunay triangulations or interpolated raster grids. Although these techniques are adequate in most general situations, they do not effectively address the specific case where topographic data is available only as cross-section and profile centerline data, such as the elevation sampling produced by traditional hydrographic surveys. The hydraulic spline algorithm was developed to generate irregular two-dimensional channel grids from hydrographic cross-sections at any desired resolution. Hydraulic spline output grids can be easily merged with datasets of higher resolution, such as LIDAR data, to build a complete model of channel geometry and overbank topography. In testing, the hydraulic spline algorithm faithfully reproduces elevations of known input cross-section points where they exist, while generating a smooth transition between known cross-sections. The algorithm performs particularly well compared to traditional techniques with respect to aesthetics and accuracy when input data is sparse. These qualities make the hydraulic spline an ideal choice for practical applications where available data may be limited due to historic or budgetary reasons.