Practical Regime Analysis of River Slopes

To assess regime peculiarities of a river, for forecasting the effects of future human interference, and for general geomorphic analysis, a chart is required defining a zone in which the data of most unobstructed rivers with uniformly mobile beds will lie. Points deviating from the zone will indicate either that the measured conditions are not entirely those of self-formation in transported material, or that the regime parameters have unusual values. Theory indicates that a zoned graph plotting representative discharge against a parameter composed of breadth, slope, and the zero bed-factor (that corresponds to vanishingly small bed-load charge) should be suitable. Such a graph is presented. It is recommended for tentative use as a regime analysis chart for all regime-type rivers under investigation. The prerequisite graph for estimating zero bed-factor from a practical measure of bed material size also is provided, together with an auxiliary one for applications involving known bed-load charge.