Waterways
serve for several functions besides transporting
goods and people. The ecological importance
of navigable rivers has taken much attention
during recent decades bringing efforts to
improve these natural corridors for fauna and
flora (Boeters et al., 1997). Followin
...
Waterways
serve for several functions besides transporting
goods and people. The ecological importance
of navigable rivers has taken much attention
during recent decades bringing efforts to
improve these natural corridors for fauna and
flora (Boeters et al., 1997). Following
the policy of the European Water Framework
Directive (WFD), many Dutch river reaches
have been recently restored through the removal
of bank protections in search for better
riparian habitats (Florsheim et al., 2009), but they also result exposed to erosive forces. Large uncertainties generally surround the
prediction of erosion rates (e.g. Samadi
et al., 2009) due to complex flow
characteristics in the near-bank region,
variable soil properties, etc. A better understanding
of bank erosion processes is then of
interest to predict erosion rates and improve
the design of future interventions.
@en
