Stream Flow in General Terms

The purpose of this paper is to present a workable general method for the analysis of stream flow in irregular channels—channels in which the invert slope and the channel cross-section are not constant. To attempt to apply the Chezy formula to such a case is to force a perfectly good formula into a situation to which it is not properly applicable. Various scattered attempts have been made to treat this question as applied to special cases, but no satisfactory general treatment has been found in such a form as to be readily followed by most computers. An exhaustive consideration of the subject of “back-water curves” is contained in “Technical Reports,” Part III, of The Miami Conservancy District, but this discussion is confined to “rectangular channels the width of which is uniform and so great in comparison with the depth that the hydraulic radius may be considered equal to the depth.”