The United States has one of the largest and costliest flood control systems in the world, even though only a small proportion of its land lies in floodplains. Rivers by Design traces the emergence of the mammoth U.S. flood management system, which is overseen by the federal government but implemented in conjunction with state governments and local contractors and levee districts. Karen M. O'Neill analyzes the social origins of the flood control program, showing how the system initially developed as a response to the demands of farmers and the business elite in outlying territories. The configuration of the current system continues to reflect decisions made in the nineteenth century and early twentieth. It favors economic development at the expense of environmental concerns.O'Neill focuses on the creation of flood control programs along the lower Mississippi River and the Sacramento River, the first two rivers to receive federal flood control aid. She describes how, in the early to mid-nineteenth century, planters, shippers, and merchants from both regions campaigned for federal assistance with flood control efforts. She explains how the federal government was slowly and reluctantly drawn into water management to the extent that, over time, nearly every river in the United States was reengineered. Her narrative culminates in the passage of the national Flood Control Act of 1936, which empowered the Army Corps of Engineers to build projects for all navigable rivers in conjunction with local authorities, effectively ending nationwide, comprehensive planning for the protection of water resources.

Diese Open-Access-Publikation ist ein anwendungsorientiertes Lehr- und Handbuch zur Abflussminderung im landlichen Raum. Meteorologische Extreme wie Durren, Starkregen und UEberschwemmungen haufen sich wegen des Klimawandels. Gleichzeitig steigt der Druck auf unsere Landschaft kontinuierlich, indem sie immer intensiver genutzt und effizienter erschlossen wird. Durch diese Entwicklungen ergeben sich dringende Herausforderungen fur den landlichen Hochwasserschutz und den Erhalt unserer naturlichen Ressourcen Wasser und Boden. Das Buch beschreibt Methoden fur die Planung von Massnahmen zur Abflussminderung. Es ist speziell fur kleine Einzugsgebiete (< 25 km(2)) konzipiert, da gerade dort viele Gemeinden durch die genannten Entwicklungen zunehmend mit Sturzfluten und UEberflutungen konfrontiert sind. Gleichzeitig koennen dezentrale Ansatze zur Abflussminderung hier am meisten bewirken. Das Handbuch richtet sich vornehmlich an Ingenieure, Planer und Berater von Landwirtschaft, Kommunen und Landlicher Entwicklung, soll aber auch Studenten und Wissenschaftlern der relevanten Fachgebiete als Informationsquelle und Nachschlagewerk dienen. Die Autoren: Dr. Simon P. Seibert ist Ingenieuroekologe und hat uber die Entstehung und Modellierung von Hochwasser in Munchen und Karlsruhe promoviert. Seit Mitte 2019 leitet er der Arbeitsgruppe Gebietshydrologie am Bayerischen Landesamt fur Umwelt. Prof. Dr. Karl Auerswald lehrt am Wissenschaftszentrum Weihenstephan fur Ernahrung, Landnutzung und Umwelt der TU Munchen. Seine Forschungsschwerpunkte der vergangenen 40 Jahre sind agraroekologische Prozesse, insbesondere der Wasserhaushalt von Landschaften, Boeden, Pflanzen und Tieren.

Mary Jo O'Rear rounds out her coastal bend trilogy with a deep and engaging look at the prehistory and history of the Texas barrier islands. In Barrier to the Bays, O'Rear captures the deep time of the islands (Mustang, Padre, and San JosE), the bays (Aransas, Corpus Christi, Copano, Redfish, and Nueces), and Aransas Pass. From the earliest human settlements to the twentieth century, O'Rear explores the complex interplay between people and economies struggling to survive in a region dominated by indifferent forces of nature.Barrier to the Bays opens with the natural formation and development of the barrier isles and the arrival of Native Americans, Spanish castaways, French explorers, and Catholic missionaries. European settlements on the mainland eventually led to rich commercial development of the area and its bounty as ranching, fishing, and transportation took hold. By the early twentieth century, the people of the Coastal Bend began wrestling with a new drive to create deep-water harbors along the coastline in the face of the ever-present hurricane threat. O'Rear shows that by World War II the region had settled into a kind of "practicality" as tourists and traders took their place among the denizens of the islands and bays. In addition to the stories of familiar historical figures, Barrier to the Bays stresses the importance of technology in the settlement and development of the region. "Nothing could have been achieved among the barriers and bays of the Coastal Bend without the right tools." O'Rear underscores the importance of properly designed sailing vessels and the centrality of navigation technology as an integral part of the barrier isle story.

Even with all the advances in technologies, humans continue to suffer from the consequences of flooding century after century. This book covers two pertinent topics: flood risk and flood management. Experts world-wide share their knowledge on these topics and highlight solutions to the flooding problems in the 21st century. Topics discussed in this book include spatial explicit multi-criteria flood risk; identification of social obstacles in solving flooding problems in Buenos Aires Province, Argentina; participative planning processes in flood risk management and in integrated watershed management; new economic instrument for integrated management of muddy flow risks; flood hazard mapping using hydrodynamic modelling approach; and simulation of flood reduction by means of complex structural measures using hydrodynamic modelling and aerial photogrammetry-derived digital surface model (DSM).

Responsibility for flood risk management in the United States is a shared responsibility between multiple Federal, State, and local government agencies with a complex set of programs and authorities. Nationally, both the US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) have programs to assist states and communities in reducing flood damages and promoting sound flood risk management. The authority to determine how land is used in floodplains and to enforce flood-wise requirements is entirely the responsibility of state and local government. Floodplain management choices made by state and local officials, in turn, impact the effectiveness of federal programs to mitigate flood risk and the performance of federal flood damage reduction infrastructure. One key challenge is to ensure that as the public and government leaders make flood risk management decisions, they integrate environmental, social, and economic factors and consider all available tools to improve public safety. Importantly, the public must be educated both as to the risks they face and actions they can take to reduce their risks. Because of this complex arrangement of responsibilities, only a life-cycle, comprehensive and collaborative systems approach will enable communities to sustain an effective reduction of risks from flooding.

South of Geneva, Switzerland, the River Aire runs across a plain that for centuries has been agricultural land. From the late 19th century, the waterway has been embanked for flood protection, also causing the gradual loss of habitat for a large variety of plants and animals. In 2001, decisions were taken to re-naturalise the river. Yet rather than to merely reconstruct its former natural bed, Superpositions, the association of firms commissioned with the project, applied 'topographic imagination', a method termed by American landscape designer Elissa Rosenberg. It combines the embanked channel with a newly designed pasture landscape. The channel indicates a work in progress and serves as a reference line that makes 'before' and 'after' traceable. This new book documents this much recognised, award-winning re-naturalisation project with drawings, images of construction work and of the new waterway. Essays and comments by international contributors Jean-Marc Besse, Lorette Coen, Gerorges Descombes, G. Mathias Kondolf, Elissa Rosenberg, Gilles A. Tiberghien, and Marc Treib demonstrate how the restored River Aire has been upgraded to become again a characteristic feature of this landscape on the fringe of the city. Text in English, French and German.

The Elkhorn River originates in north-central Nebraska and empties into the Platte River just west of Omaha. One of the first written records of the Elkhorn describes a flood. A flood hindered travel up the river by the valley's first non-Indian settlers. Decade after decade, floods have swept away mill dams, destroyed crops, drowned stock, soaked inventories, filled basements, undercut roads, washed out railroads and bridges, turned unfortunate riverside homesaEURO"even a dance hallaEURO"into unwieldy watercraft, and killed people. Everyone in the Elkhorn Valley agreed the Flood of 1944 was the worst in history. Until the deadly Flood of 2010 took the title. From a perspective unusual on the Great PlainsaEURO"the problem of too much wateraEURO" Flood on the Tracks offers an intimate portrait of life in the Elkhorn River Basin of northeast Nebraska. In a region often defined by aridity, rivers and their basins have provided sustenance, shelter, fertile soil, and overland highways. In many ways Plains rivers organize human lives. When they overflow, which they can be counted on to do, they disorganize them. Using Plains Indian winter counts, postcards, photographs, newspaper accounts, government records, and more, Flood on the Tracks chronicles the river's natural and human history from the Plains Indians into the twenty-first century. The Elkhorn's floods show us how the nature of disaster has changed and how Plainsfolk liveaEURO"and dieaEURO"with a river.