Navigation Channels and Sedimentation

Navigation channel design width, depth, and alignment depend on vessel size, traffic flow, and factors such as tides, water levels, winds, waves, and currents. Navigation channels can be categorized by depth: shallow-draft and deep-draft channels. Navigation channels may also be classified as inland or coastal channels. The US Army Corps of Engineers classifies the Gulf and Atlantic Intracoastal Waterways as inland navigation channels, but they are subject to many of the sedimentation processes of a coastal channel. Channel configuration and alignment - its geometric features - affect sedimentation processes in multiple, interacting ways. Some major aspects of those configurations are described in this chapter. Navigation channel sedimentation problems are most often deposition or excessive erosion. Off-channel sedimentation issues include erosion of and deposition to banklines, shallow bars, marshes, and in adjacent waterways influenced by navigation channels. Bankline and shoreline erosion can be a source of sediment supply to a channel, potentially increasing channel sedimentation.