Effects of flood plain management on river hydraulics - a case study

Anthropogenic activities on rivers and flood plains can have significant impacts on the subsequent responses of the river to various flood events. Historically, many developments were carried out across rivers and along flood plains without regard to consideration of potential changes to the river - flood plain system. In some instances these developments have had positive impacts, such as improved flood control when a dam was employed to impound water. However, in other cases developments have led to increased and unplanned flooding. Ibis paper presents details of a case study which considers the impacts of siting an unplanned landfill on the floodplain of a river. In particular, the paper presents results of a hydraulic model study, using DAMBRK that was carried out to assess the impacts on the river hydraulics due to the development on the flood plain. A discussion of the results follows.