Excerpt
Interest in restoration of ecological, aesthetic, and recreational values to degraded stream channels has grown enormously in recent years, as has interest in developing flood control strategies that retain ecological values and avoid concrete channelization (Evans 1991; NRC 1992; Williams 1990). The term “stream (or river) restoration” is frequently used to encompass all such efforts at ecologically sound river management, even though some of these projects do not actually involve restoration of ecologically degraded channels, but rather attempt to minimize the negative environmental effects of channel relocation or flood management works. Stream “restoration” in the latter sense has also been termed stream “renovation,” “reclamation,” or “rehabilitation” (Nunnally 1976; Ferguson 1991; Kern 1992). The purpose of this paper is to review a range of stream restoration project goals and activities carried out in North America and Europe, to present two case studies illustrating contrasting goals and techniques, and to demonstrate the need for systematic studies evaluating the success of restoration projects.
Review of restoration goals and activities
Channel stabilization. Channel instability is a particularly common problem in western North America, where streams that were formerly stable, narrow meandering channels, have been …
Footnotes
G. Mathias Kondolf is in the Department of Landscape Architecture, University of California, Berkeley CA 94720. The author would like to thank Andrew Brookes, John Gardiner, Lindis Cole, Richard Copas, Kim Wilkie, Walter Binder, Graham Matthews, and Lisa Micheli. Manuscript preparation was supported by the White Mountain Research Station and the Beatrice Farrand Fund of the Department of Landscape Architecture, University of California at Berkeley.
- Copyright 1996 by the Soil and Water Conservation Society
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