GEOMOR-04751; No of Pages 9

Geomorphology xxx (2014) xxxxxx

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Geomorphology
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/geomorph

FluvialCorridor: A new ArcGIS toolbox package for multiscale

riverscape exploration
Clment Roux a,, Adrien Alber b, Mlanie Bertrand a,c, Lise Vaudor a, Herv Pigay a
a

University of Lyon, CNRS-UMR 5600 Environnement - Ville - Socit, ENS de Lyon, 15 Parvis Ren Descartes, BP 7000, 69342 Lyon Cedex 07, France
Direction Rgionale de l'Environnement, de l'Amnagement et du Logement (Rgion Centre), Service Eau et Biodiversit, 5 avenue Buffon, 45064 Orlans Cedex, France
IRSTEA-rosion torrentielle, neige et avalanches (ETGR)-Centre de Grenoble, National Research Institute for Environmental and Agricultural Sciences and Technologies, Domaine universitaire,
2 rue de la Papeterie-BP 76, 38402, Saint-Martin-d'Hres Cedex, France

b
c

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history:
Received 17 October 2013
Received in revised form 26 March 2014
Accepted 1 April 2014
Available online xxxx
Keywords:
Fluvial geomorphology
Riverscape
Channel reach
GIS toolbox
Automated multiscale procedure
River discontinuum

a b s t r a c t
Both for scientists and river basin managers, development of automated geographic information system (GIS)
tools is essential today to characterize riverscapes and explore biogeomorphologic processes over large channel
networks. Since the 1990s, GIS toolboxes and add-in programs have been used to characterize catchments. However, there is currently no equivalent to a planimetric and longitudinal characterization of uvial corridor networks at multiple scales. This paper describes FluvialCorridor, a new GIS toolbox. This package allows the user:
(i) to extract a large set of riverscape features such as the main components of uvial corridors from DEM and
vector layers (e.g. stream network or valley bottom), and (ii) to aggregate spatial features into homogeneous segments and metrics characterizing each of them. The methodological frameworks involved have been previously
described by Alber and Pigay (2011), Leviandier et al. (2012) and Bertrand et al. (2013) and this contribution
focuses on the GIS tools allowing the user to automatically operate them. A case study on the Drme River
(France) is provided to illustrate the potential of the package both for geomorphologic understanding and target
management actions. FluvialCorridor has been developed for ArcGIS with the related native Python library named
ArcPy and tested on ArcGIS 10.0 and 10.1. Obviously, each component of the package can be used separately;
however, it also provides a complete workow for uvial corridor characterization, even as the toolbox is continually under development and revision. Case study database, FluvialCorridor package and guidelines are available
online at http://umrevs-isig.fr.
2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Fluvial corridor and riverscape concepts were introduced in the
1960s by Leopold and Marchand (1968) and have been widely used
since the early 2000s (Fausch et al., 2002; Wiens, 2002; Eros et al.,
2010; Bertrand et al., 2013). Carbonneau et al. (2012) dene the
riverscape as an ecological representation of rivers. This uvial object is
a combination of broad scale units with energy, matter and biota transfers. In reference to the early notion of a uvial continuum (Schumm,
1977; Vannote et al., 1980), riverscapes are longitudinally organized
and can be characterized by a set of nested units emerging at different
spatial and temporal scales and corresponding to both well-identied
areal features (e.g. river styles, erosion features, active channel) and
their boundaries, and more synthetic features (e.g., elementary sampling
features, linear features such as centerline). Riverscape units can be described (i) longitudinally, considering hydraulic, geomorphologic and
ecological patterns, (ii) transversally, to focus on biomorphological interactions between channels and oodplains or hillslopes through the
Corresponding author. Tel.: +33 6 01 31 07 26.
E-mail address: clement.roux@ens-lyon.fr (C. Roux).

network, (iii) vertically, focusing on exchanges between the surface waters and groundwaters and (iv) in time, to highlight inuences of anthropogenic pressures or changes in ood events at 1- to 100-year
scale (Swanson et al., 1982; Gregory et al., 1991). Riverscape units are
usually viewed as nested within each other from the network to the
segment reach, from the meso to micro-habitats (Allen and Starr,
1982; Frissell et al., 1986; ONeill et al., 1986). These units therefore include valley segments, geomorphic reaches, in-channel and oodplain
features (e.g. bars, rifes, pools, vegetation and islands, oodplain channels) (Kondolf et al., 2003).
Thus riverscapes are becoming more and more studied by geomorphologists, freshwater ecologists and managers to characterize
biophysical features in terms of quality and health, and to provide
understanding of the network organization, its sensitivity to
human pressures and its ability to adjust (Fausch et al., 2002;
Wiens, 2002; Thorp et al., 2006; Le Pichon et al., 2009; Carbonneau
et al., 2012; Bertrand et al., 2013). With the increasing availability
of network-scale data, such analyses are becoming more and more
common and automatic procedures to extract information are thus
needed. By sharing these types of tools, our intention is to better enable researchers and river managers to characterize networks,

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.geomorph.2014.04.018
0169-555X/ 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Please cite this article as: Roux, C., et al., FluvialCorridor: A new ArcGIS toolbox package for multiscale riverscape exploration, Geomorphology
(2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.geomorph.2014.04.018

C. Roux et al. / Geomorphology xxx (2014) xxxxxx

which is a major challenge for planning and targeting restoration

actions.
Previous signicant technical tools for characterizing rivers and uvial
features have already been developed (Table 1). In the text below, the
numerical superscripts refer to the rows in Table 1. Firstly, ArcHydroTools1
is available primarily as a method for basin and hydrographic characterization. It provides a large set of tools used for two key purposes: ensuring either raster, vector or attributes treatments (e.g. stream burning,
network generation, attribute transfers or accumulation) and attribute
assessments (e.g. unique ID assignment, ordination, arc-length or watershed area measurements). Additional tools have also been created in
order to investigate relationships between physical, chemical and biological parameters at a basin scale. Thus, STARS2, SSN2 or FLoWS3 allows for
exploring and predicting catchment-scale information through spatial
autocorrelation. Other researchers have attempted to provide elements
for a longitudinal characterization of stream networks. TauDEM4 provides
tools to extract stream networks from DEMs attributing each link with a
hydrologic and morphologic metric like upstream contributing area,
slope, or cumulative distance. Assessment of some planimetric metrics
(e.g. steepness index and concavity) has also been implemented within
the Stream Proler5ArcGIS toolset. Multiple other examples of free,
open-source software which carry out the morphometric characterization of catchments exist, such as GRASS6 (Neteler and Mitasova, 2002),
SAGA GIS7 (Bhner et al., 2006), Multi Watershed Delineation8 tool
(Chinnayakanahalli et al., 2006) or Geospatial Modeling Environment9.
As new accurate remote sensing techniques and data have become
more widely available (e.g. LiDAR, drone imagery), several tools have
also been developed in response. River Bathymetric Toolkit10 (RBT) is
one example among others. Especially designed for reach-scale studies,
it enables the user to access uvial units (e.g. centerlines, banks, bankfull
water channel) and hydromorphic metrics, mainly related to the river
cross-sections. High resolution DEMs are thus essential to use RBT. Developed by Thomas Dilts, Riparian Topography11 is another ArcGIS toolbox
which is useful for riverscape characterization. Also based on high resolution DEMs processing, Riparian Topography provides a basis for exploring
and modeling plant species distribution along reaches by extracting
height above river and inundation area rasters (Dilts et al., 2010).
Despite, or rather because of the proliferation of toolboxes to characterize channel reaches with more specicity, there remains a need for
an automated process that allows the user to characterize riverscape
units along river corridor networks in multiscale and planimetric
ways. According to the recent geomatics and statistical improvements
(Alber and Pigay, 2011; Leviandier et al., 2012; Bertrand et al., 2013),
development of such an ArcGIS toolbox, which accelerates such information production, is now possible. This toolkit can be considered as
the basis of knowledge production at a large scale, which is a new scientic frontier. This article describes a new toolbox named FluvialCorridor,
designed to extract and characterize uvial features at a range of scales
along a stream network.

2. Required extensions and toolboxes

FluvialCorridor toolbox has been developed for ArcGIS 10.0 and
ArcGIS 10.1, running with the related ArcPy and Python 2.6 or 2.7 libraries. Some ArcGIS extensions such as SpatialAnalyst, are required for
ensuring an optimal use and allowing all functionalities. Moreover,
FluvialCorridor requires additional components (e.g. NumPy and SciPy
libraries, ArcHydroTools). Further details about compatibility of the toolbox and installation of additional components are given within the set
of guidelines attached to the toolbox.
3. General framework
FluvialCorridor has been developed based on the general workow
initiated by Alber and Pigay (2011). They developed a methodological
framework for delineating and characterizing uvial features based on
raw data available at a regional (over 1000 km2) scale (e.g. vector hydrographic network, DEM, archives aerial photos). The combination of
information extracted from different sources allows the user to extract
geomorphic characteristics of uvial features at different spatial levels.
Fig. 1 illustrates an example of the general framework involved during
a complete use of the FluvialCorridor package.
As the methodological framework, the FluvialCorridor toolbox is
subdivided in four main processes (Fig. 2). The rst step consists in
extracting unitary geographical objects (UGOs) that delineate the features of interest (e.g. the active channel, the valley bottom, etc.). Then,
the spatial disaggregation of unitary geographical objects results in disaggregated geographical objects (DGOs).Thirdly, the phase of characterization is processed. A set of metrics is calculated at the DGO database
scale, according the focus of interest. Finally, the spatial aggregation of
the DGOs into aggregated geographical objects (AGOs) allows delineation
of physically meaningful uvial features. Fig. 2B shows those units from
a theoretical point a view and Table 2 details the different tools of the
package.
3.1. Extracted uvial units and spatial disaggregation
As a rst step, the toolset named Spatial components enables the
user to extract UGOs such as the hydrographic network, the valley bottom or centerline of polygon features, from a DEM or vector layers.
Once linear and polygon features (UGOs) have been extracted, they
can be disaggregated into elementary segments (DGOs) of a given userdened and constant length using the Disaggregation processes
toolset. This spatial disaggregation aims to provide uvial units at a
higher resolution for the characterization process. The spatial resolution
(i.e. the disaggregation step) must be set precisely to ensure that spatial
trends are correctly detected (i.e. by analogy with the Nyquist-Shannon
sampling theorem in information theory, the disaggregation step must
be ner than the scale of investigation (Nyquist, 1928)).

Table 1
List of existing tools for characterizing rivers or uvial features and dataset used in the case study over the Drme River (France).
Material's name

Developer

Web-link

ArcHydroTools
STARS
SSN
FLoWS
TauDEM
Stream Proler
GRASS
SAGA GIS
Multi Watershed Delineation
Geospatial Modeling Environment
River Bathymetric Toolkit
Riparian Topography
BD Carthage
BD Topo

ESRI
United State National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and Australian
Commonwealth Scientic and Industrial Research Organization
United State Space-Time Aquatic Resources Modeling and Analysis Program
David Tarboton-Utah State University
Noah Synder and Kelin Whipple-US National Science Foundation and NASA
Geographic Resources Analysis Support System GRASS
System for Automated Geoscientic Analyses SAGA GIS
Kiran Chinnayakanahalli-Utah State University
Hawthorne L. Bayer-Spatial Ecology
ESSA Technologies and US Forest Service
Thomas Dilt
French National Geographical Institute IGN

www.esri.com
http://www.fs.fed.us/rmrs
http://www.nrel.colostate.edu
http://hydrology.usu.edu/taudem
http://www.geomorphtools.org
http://grass.osgeo.org
http://www.saga-gis.org
http://hydrology.usu.edu/mwdtool
www.spatialecology.com/gme
http://essa.com/tools/rbt
http://arcscripts.esri.com
www.ign.fr

Please cite this article as: Roux, C., et al., FluvialCorridor: A new ArcGIS toolbox package for multiscale riverscape exploration, Geomorphology
(2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.geomorph.2014.04.018

C. Roux et al. / Geomorphology xxx (2014) xxxxxx

Both for linear and polygon UGOs, the disaggregation processes are
based on the segmentation of a polyline feature. A python script
named SLEM (for Split Lines Each Meter) has been developed to split
polyline features with a user-dened and constant length. Each line is
processed separately, but it must be correctly oriented to ensure a consistent ordering of resulting segments within the network. Rotation of
wrongly-oriented streams is carried out by a specic tool named
Sequencing. Finally, disaggregation of linear UGOs is directly conducted by the SLEM tool, whereas polygon UGOs disaggregation is based on
the segmentation of the centerline and a Thiessen polygonization. Each
DGO is spatially referenced into the network by: (i) Order_ID and
Rank_UGO elds of the UGO they belong to, and (ii) Distance eld ordering them between each conuence from upstream to downstream.
The Order_ID eld can be viewed as a stream order. Unlike the Strahler
or Shreve orders, Order_ID is dened increasingly from downstream
to upstream.
The Polyline disaggregation tool ensures another disaggregation
process applied to linear UGOs. It provides (i) inection points of the
input polyline and (ii) arcs between each of them. These DGO-scale
units are not segmented in the conventional sense of spatial disaggregation since the length of disaggregated segments is not a user-dened constant. In that case, a DGO is dened as the arc between two successive
inection points and they are attributed as any other DGO (i.e. Order_ID,
Rank_UGO and Distance elds populate the nal attribute table).
3.2. Metrics calculation and spatial aggregation
Though the nal goal is to re-aggregate the basin-scale characteristics, these disaggregated continuums must rst be characterized with
one or a set of metrics. The FluvialCorridor toolbox allows the user to assess such metrics through the Metrics toolset. For example, each DGO
can be described in terms of sinuosity index, channel width or cumulative linear of contact into the uvial corridor (i.e. so called ecotones in
ecology, it refers to the transitional zone between two different biophysical features (Ward et al., 1999) such as gravel bars, vegetation or
water surfaces).
Finally, the toolset named Statistics enables to statistically aggregate the attributed DGOs by using the Hubert algorithm (Hubert,
2000; Kehagias et al., 2005). Leviandier et al. (2012) compared a set of
seven existing methods for delineating homogeneous segments based
on univariate series. They concluded that the Hubert test of homogeneity and the Hidden Markov Models are especially successful for identifying longitudinal discontinuities. We chose the rst one, which provides
a segmentation once the difference of the mean between two consecutive segments is signicant. So the Hubert test is used to investigate subpatterns encapsulated in the uvial continuum, locate the longitudinal
discontinuities and aggregate DGOs into AGOs (i.e. homogeneous
reaches). The number of AGOs depends on a criterion and any change
of its value modies constraints for the AGOs delineation (i.e. increasing
relaxes constraints and enables the test to identify more homogeneous reaches). Leviandier et al. (2012) showed this parameter not as
a common condence level but rather as a level of the risk governing
the segmentation size.
Over an entire disaggregated network and for a given metric, the
Hubert test tool processes each DGO of a UGO from upstream to
downstream. Hence the best segmentation is found (i.e. the one inducing the most relevant difference between two consecutive segments
with respect to the limiting criterion ), DGOs are attributed with
Rank_AGO and AGO_Val elds. The Rank_AGO eld contains a
unique ID for each AGO and AGO_Val is the mean value of the given
metric over an AGO (Fig. 2B).
4. Automatic production of a multiscale geomorphic database
Through an archetypal and theoretical workow (Fig. 1), this section
details the different tools of the FluvialCorridor package. It also focuses

on connections between the geographical units created during a process. According to the objectives of the case studies and the available
input data, such a framework can be either simplied or expanded
and conducted from a local to a regional scale.
4.1. Required input data
The full use of the FluvialCorridor toolbox presented in Fig. 1 requires
three raw data: a DEM and two vector layers, the hydrographic network
of the study area and its active channel. External data can be joined to
enrich the process with new information. Here, aerial photographs are
so used to illustrate potential gains provided by such an external data.
Today, DEMs, aerial or satellite photographs and hydrographic networks are widely produced over the world and active channel layers
can be obtained from manual digitalization or from radiometric analysis
of aerial or satellite photographs (Marcus et al., 2003; Wiederkehr,
2012; Bertrand et al., 2013).
4.2. Extraction of UGO-scale units
4.2.1. Stream network extraction (UGO1)
The stream network is extracted from the input DEM. The framework is based on the widely used process introduced by O'Callaghan
and Mark (1984) and involves the assessment of the drainage accumulation raster from the original DEM. Over this accumulation raster, the
stream network is vectorized into a polyline feature according a userdened drainage area to uniformly initiate the nal stream network.
Setting a consistent drainage area is a crucial step to extract a relevant
network. Associated scale and resolution effects are discussed in
Tarboton et al. (1991). Following Saunders (1999) and others, such as
Lamouroux et al. (2008), a stream burning step can be added to the process to improve network delineation. Ensured by the ArcHydroTools ESRI
package, this optional step enables a vector layer from a pre-existing
network to be embedded into the original DEM.
4.2.2. Valley bottom extraction (UGO2)
Within the FluvialCorridor toolbox, the framework used to extract
the valley bottom is the one previously developed by Alber and Pigay
(2011).The Valley bottom tool is thus based on the extraction of two
rasters (i.e. a reference altimetric plan and a relative DEM) from the
input DEM and a stream network. Accordingly, this unit is dened as
the set of DEM cells with an elevation value between the stream elevation (assumed to be the minimal elevation in a user-dened buffer surrounding the stream network) and an empirically-dened threshold
corresponding to the submerged oodplain for a uniform waterow
height (Williams et al., 2000).
4.2.3. Centerline extraction (UGO4)
The Centerline tool, which involves a framework previously developed by Alber and Pigay (2011), can be used to extract a centerline for
any long polygon (i.e. with one larger dimension compared to the
other), including valley bottoms, active channels, or any other homogeneous and continuous unitary geographical object. The process is based
on a Thiessen polygonization of the segmented boundaries of the input
polygon.
4.3. DGO-scale database from spatial disaggregation
The spatial disaggregation can be conducted on any UGO covering a
reach or a network. At this stage of the toolbox use, we illustrate the
method with six DGOs layers (Fig. 1).
DGO1 and DGO6 represent channel patterns passing through inection
points. They are assessed by the Polyline disaggregation tool. Then
DGO2, DGO3, DGO4 and DGO5 relate to the spatial disaggregation of linear
or polygon units they belong to (i.e. UGO1, UGO2, UGO3 and UGO4). Linear

Please cite this article as: Roux, C., et al., FluvialCorridor: A new ArcGIS toolbox package for multiscale riverscape exploration, Geomorphology
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C. Roux et al. / Geomorphology xxx (2014) xxxxxx

Raw data

Digitized stream
network

Stream network
(UGO1)

DGO1

(UGO2)
Rank / Distance
Watershed area
Elevation
Slope
Flows
Stream power
Drainage density

Active channel
(UGO3)

DGO3
Rank / Distance
Valley bottom width
Confinement index

DGO
UGO

scale database

Eroded areas
detection

Connectivity
DEM

Valley bottom

DGO2

Channel pattern

Rank / Distance
Sinuosity
Halh-length
Half-amplitude
Arc length

Theoretical
network

Aerial
photographs

Vector layers

DEM

Centerline
DGO4
Rank / Distance
Active channel width
Contact length
Confinement index
Shifting
Widenning
Eroded volumes

Extraction
Disaggregation
Transfer information
Aggregation
Intermediate data or processes

(UGO4)

DGO5
Rank / Distance
Eroded Areas

External data or processes

Available metrics

DGO6
Channel pattern

Rank / Distance
Sinuosity
Halh-length
Half-amplitude
Arc length

AGO-scale

Non exhaustive list of derived metrics

AGO

Spatial
discontinuities

Fig. 1. Example of an AGO-scale database extraction through the FluvialCorridor package. This theoretical framework involves all the tools of the package so that three input raw data are
required. Aerial photographs are used to illustrate potential investigations provided by external data. Four UGO-scale units are created: spatial components and a reference centerline.
Then, they are disaggregated into a DGO-scale database to rene the accuracy of the morphometric, geomorphic and topologic metrics stored in the related attribute tables. An AGOscale database is created by merging DGO-scale units into homogeneous reaches thanks to the Hubert test.

features (e.g. UGO1 and UGO4) are rst sequenced and oriented with the
Sequencing tool to have consistent results.
The resolution of the DGO-scale database is a user-dened parameter so that the user may modify the disaggregation step to investigate
different biophysical patterns within riverscapes. According to the raw
data precision, ne and detailed disaggregation enables the user to
identify very local trends by increasing the accuracy of metric calculation. Conversely, managers can attempt to catch regional behaviors
thanks to a coarser-scale disaggregation. Thus, for each UGO, disaggregation scales must be set smaller than the scale at which forms and processes of interest occurs but coarse enough to be appropriate to the
precision of the raw input data.
4.4. Metric characterization of the riverscape
Fig. 1 provides a general overview of these metrics, either directly
extracted with FluvialCorridor package or derived from others or from
external data or processes (e.g. connectivity DEM, image analysis).
Firstly, channel patterns (i.e. DGO1 and DGO6) can be viewed as reference axis for linear features such as UGO1 and UGO4. The Morphometry

tool enables the user to assess a set of morphometric attributes (e.g. sinuosity, half-length, half-amplitude and arc length) against linear features
thanks to their related channel patterns. Their accuracy directly depends
on the quality of the input linear feature and they can be stored into the
channel pattern or into the linear feature. Sinuosity is thus calculated for
each arc of a UGO as the ratio of the UGO arc length over the channel pattern segment length. Processes used to assess half-length, halfamplitude and arc-length are those described in Alber and Pigay
(2011).
Then, DGO2 has been chosen to store geomorphic and topologic
metrics. Indeed, from the raw DEM input, FluvialCorridor package proposes to assess the watershed area, the mean elevation and the slope
for each segment of the entire network, from upstream to downstream.
The watershed area is simply extracted from the drainage accumulation
raster of the DEM. The elevation is stored into three different elds:
(i) upstream elevation, (ii) downstream elevation, and (iii) mean elevation over a DGO. The slope is calculated by dividing the difference between the upstream and downstream elevation by the DGO length.
Lastly, width values for polygon units such as the valley bottom or
the active channel can be calculated with the Width tool of the

Please cite this article as: Roux, C., et al., FluvialCorridor: A new ArcGIS toolbox package for multiscale riverscape exploration, Geomorphology
(2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.geomorph.2014.04.018

C. Roux et al. / Geomorphology xxx (2014) xxxxxx

Fig. 2. Implementation of the spatial disaggregation and aggregation procedure developed by Alber and Pigay (2011). The rst row describes the general framework involved in the
FluvialCorridor package, from the raw data to the AGO-scale database extraction. The second row illustrates the different databases and the related geographical objects creating during
the process.

Metrics toolset. Valley bottom width is thus assessed into the DGO3
using the framework developed by Alber and Pigay (2011) which requires creating points at a constant length on the UGO2 boundaries.
The resulting width values are measured as the projection of these
points on the centerline (i.e. UGO4). The active channel width is assessed
into the DGO4. The process is based on a Thiessen polygonization of the
centerline (i.e. UGO4) and the active channel width is assessed as the intersection between Thiessen polygons boundaries and UGO3. Another
metric, named Contact length, can be calculated with the DGO4 and

corresponds to the cumulative linear boundary shared between two adjacent biophysical features (e.g. water/bar).
4.5. Extraction of homogeneous reaches and longitudinal discontinuities
Once the DGO-scale database is characterized with at least one metric, spatial aggregation can be conducted with the Hubert test tool of
the Statistics toolset. This statistical test is univariate so that only
one numerical metric can be assessed each run. For an entire network,

Table 2
Summary of tools included in the FluvialCorridor package, sorted according to four toolsets: (i) extraction of Spatial Components, (ii) spatial Disaggregation Processes,
(iii) characterization with a set of Metrics, and (iv) spatial aggregation with Statistics tools.
Tools

Description

Stream network
Valley bottom
Centerline
Sequencing
Segmentation
Polyline disaggregation
Contact length
Elevation and Slope
Morphometry
Discontinuities
Watershed
Width
Hubert test

extraction of the stream network from a DEM

extraction of the valley bottom with a DEM and a stream network
extraction of the centerline of a polygon
orientation and ordination of a linear network
disaggregation of entities, with a user-given constant step
extraction of the disaggregated pattern of a linear network passing through inection points
assessment of the cumulative contact length between a set of polygons
assessment of the elevation and the slope along a linear network
assessment of a set of morphometric units along a linear network
assessment of the ratio between two consecutive DGOs for a given metric
assessment of the drainage area along a network
assessment of the width of polygons
identication of longitudinal discontinuities thanks to the statistical test of Hubert and re-calculate
metric value into each AGO

Spatial components

Disaggregation processes

Metrics

Statistics

Please cite this article as: Roux, C., et al., FluvialCorridor: A new ArcGIS toolbox package for multiscale riverscape exploration, Geomorphology
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C. Roux et al. / Geomorphology xxx (2014) xxxxxx

each different UGO is processed successively. The nal output result includes two elds more than the input DGOs layer: Rank_AGO, a unique
ID for each AGO identied and AGO_Val, the mean value of the given
metric over an AGO. This attribute table format allows to keep the
DGO-scale characterization into the AGO-scale database.
Longitudinal discontinuities along the network can also be extracted
into a multi-point feature thanks to the Discontinuities tool of the
Statistics toolset. The AGO_Val ratio of two consecutive AGOs is
transferred into a point. This point is precisely located at the break between the two AGOs. This functionality enables to represent discontinuities breaks as consistent geographical objects.
5. Application example on the Drme River (France)
The present section illustrates how the toolbox is used for characterizing geomorphic features. We apply it to the Drme River (France) continuum to identify distinct geomorphic reaches along a river course and
to distinguish unconstrained and constrained reaches by anthropogenic
infrastructure (e.g. embankments) or geological connements.
5.1. Background
5.1.1. Study area
The Drme River is a 106 km long tributary of the Rhne River
(Fig. 3A) and its catchment of 1660 km2 lies between 800 and 2000 m
of elevation. Located in the Southern French Alps, it drains the Vercors
and Diois massifs, a steep and mountainous terrain of Mesozoic limestone and marl (Pigay et al., 2004).
This continuum has been chosen for illustrating the present GIS procedure because its geomorphic pattern is constrained longitudinally in
terms of anthropogenic and natural connement (Landon et al., 1998).
We focused our example on two reaches (C1 and C2 on Fig. 3A). The
rst one is situated within the upper part of the Drme River, from
Die to Vercheny. This 15.3 km reach is characterized by two steep gorges
separated and surrounded by wide alluvial valleys. The second one is in
the downstream part of the river, between Crest and Livron-sur-Drme.
Along this13.8 km reach, originally highly braided, the channel has been
locally constrained by embankments.
5.1.2. Available data
Within France, several databases are available and provide a large
set of geographical data. Thus, respectively from the BD Carthage12
and the BD Topo12, we extracted the stream network and the DEM
of the Drme River catchment. The stream network is 593 km long, including the main tributaries of the Drme River. The DEM has a 50 m
resolution.
Over the past two decades, numerous scientic studies and integrated river plans have been conducted on the Drme River, resulting in a
broad range of available data. Thus, the last input of our study case, a
vector layer of the active channel, comes from the Crateur de Drme
project, started in 2008 and supported by the ZABR and GRAIE programs
and the Rhne-Mediterranean basin authority. It has been extracted
thanks to image analysis of infra-red orthophotos.
5.2. Methods
The general workow is presented in the Fig. 3B.
First, we used the Spatial components toolset to create a UGO-scale
database over the study area (Fig. 3B, step ). A consistent stream network of 101 km has been extracted thanks to the Stream network tool.
The raw DEM has been burned with the agree stream of the BD Carthage and a minimum drainage area of 65 km2 has been set empirically both to reduce the drainage density and also to extract the entire
Drme River. We proceeded to a quick manual cleaning of the resulting
network in order to only select the Drme River main stem. Then, we
ran the Valley bottom tool. After having tested several elevation

thresholds, the valley bottom was extracted and cleaned by removing

alluvial fans and lling residual holes. We visually validated this UGO
with an existing layer from the Crateurs de Drme project. Finally, we
used the Centerline tool with a 5 m disaggregation step to create a
89.6 km centerline related to the valley bottom.
To distinguish conned from unconned reaches within our two
reaches, we had to compute a connement index, dened here as the
ratio between the active channel width and the valley bottom width
and viewed as an indicator of the potential of the stream's lateral mobility. This metric must be stored into one of the geomorphic components
which are representative of the uvial continuum: the stream network,
the valley bottom or the centerline. We chose the valley bottom because
it is a physically meaningful riverscape unit and because it allows a consistent visualization of results. Hence, we created a DGO-scale database
thanks to the Disaggregation processes toolset (Fig. 3B step ). First,
we ran the Sequencing tool to ensure a good orientation of the valley
bottom centerline. This sequenced centerline was used to disaggregate
the valley bottom polygon every 100 m (Segmentation tool).
At the same time, we executed the Width tool of the Metrics
toolset (Fig. 3B step and ) to calculate needed metrics. Along the
centerline and each 20 m, a rst set of points with the valley bottom
width information (WVB) and another one with the active channel
width (WAC) were created. Those attributes were then transferred into
the DGO-scale database thanks to a spatial join (Fig. 3B step ). Only
one DGO did not receive a valley bottom width and nine had no value
of active channel width. This is due to either a lack of information
from the active channel layer or inconsistent DGOs (see Section 6.1).
Lastly, we calculated the connement index (CI).
Finally, we used the Statistics toolset, with an criterion of 0.05, to
aggregate the attributed DGO-scale database in two sets of AGOs
(Fig. 3B step ). The Hubert test tool was run two times: one over
the CI in the reach C1 and another one over WAC in the reach C2.
5.3. Results
This section focuses on results presented in Fig. 3C1 and C2. They are
based on the two AGO-scale databases which have been produced from
the 897 DGOs of the Drme River. Among this DGO-scale database, WVB
varies between 62.7 m and 4373.6 m (W VB : 831.7 m) and WAC between
0.5 m and 372.6 m (W AC : 81.4 m). The connement index CI is between
2.1 104 and 0.76 (CI: 0.15).
5.3.1. Upper part of the Drme River: reach C1
We chose the reach C1 to illustrate how useful the FluvialCorridor
toolbox can be to distinguish geologically conned reaches from alluvial
valleys, within which the active channel can freely shift. Following
Wiederkehr (2012), a CI of 0.3 can be used to identify geological connements, i.e. above this threshold, we assumed that the valley has a
signicant control on the channel shift. In that way, we used the AGOscale database constructed with the connement index. The reach C1 includes 105 DGOs aggregated into 6 different aggregated reaches which
extend from 700 m to 3.2 km. As shown in the Fig. 3C1, and according to
the 0.3 threshold of connement index, Reaches 2, 3 and 5 can be identied as conned reaches (i.e. respectively CI = 0.56; 0.33; 0.38). Considering the connement index, the 3 others AGOs appear to be
unconned (CI(1) = 0.16; CI(4) = 0.16; CI(6) = 0.23). This is strongly
conrmed visually on the orthophotos and by the contour lines of
elevation.
5.3.2. Lower part of the Drme River: reach C2
We chose the reach C2 to illustrate how the FluvialCorridor toolbox
can be used to distinguish braided reaches from embanked reaches.
The reach C2 is overlaid by 124 DGOs which have been aggregated
into four homogeneous reaches in terms of active channel width.
Those aggregated reaches vary from 1.1 to 5.1 km and two pairs clearly
emerge according to WAC.: Reaches 1 and 3 [84.4 m; 91.7 m] and

Please cite this article as: Roux, C., et al., FluvialCorridor: A new ArcGIS toolbox package for multiscale riverscape exploration, Geomorphology
(2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.geomorph.2014.04.018

C. Roux et al. / Geomorphology xxx (2014) xxxxxx

A
Livron sur
Drme

La

Ge

rv
an

B
Die

C2

Le Rh

agree
stream

C1

Crest
Vercheny

ne

La Drme

active
channel

DEM

Le Bs

La
Ro
an
ne

Drme basin
Drme river
main tributaries
secondary tributaries
main cities

10 km

FluvialCorridor tools
1 "Spatial components"

UGOs
stream network
valley bottom
centerline

Stream network
Valley bottom
Centerline

2 "Disaggregation processes"

Sequencing
Segmentation

1 km

3 & 4 "Metrics" : Width

6 "Statistics" : Hubert test

53m

271m
240m
242m
229m
228m
185m
199m
166m
170m
157m
141m
149m
116m
135m
110m
123m
109m
110m
110m
108m

50

55m

48m
43m

44m
43m

47m

47m
46m

40m
14m
21m

100 m

50

100 m

Metrics
valley bottom width (20m)
active channel width (20m)

1 km

FID Order_ID Rank_UGO Rank_DGO Distance Width_VB

Width_AC

Conf_Index

12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20

23.98450
43.75596
29.85080
52.71579
55.65886
36.20536
30.20107
10.87599
35.41414

0.194484
0.396014
0.311878
0.418837
0.320387
0.25531
0.26914
0.097915
0.247565

1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1

1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1

1200
1300
1400
1500
1600
1700
1800
1900
2000

12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20

123.32378
110.491
95.71298
125.86233
173.72395
141.80922
112.21320
111.07617
143.0410

5
Spatial join
attributed DGOs

0.56

0.16

homogeneous valley
AGOs : segments based on active
channel width ( =0.05)

400

0.16

60

50 0

70

40 0

0.33

40

50
60

91.7

0
5

45m

homogeneous valley segments

based on confinement index ( =0.05)

AGOs :

50

44m
44m

DGOs
disaggregated valley bottom (100m)

37m
40m

0,5

0.38

700

2 km

1 km

194.0

60 0

active channel (water / bar)

196.8
isolines 100m

84.4

isolines 25m

AGOs boundaries

C1

0.23

0.23

confinement index (CI) =

AGOs boundaries
embanked reaches
(water / bar)
embankments 91.7 active channel width (m)

active channel

confined reaches
6

active channel width

valley bottom width

C2

Fig. 3. (A) Location of the Drme River basin in France and the two reaches C1 and C2 within the main hydrographic network. (B) Main steps of the study case workow. (C1) and (C2)
Results over the two reaches of the Drme River: homogeneous reaches in terms of connement index in C1 and in terms of active channel width in C2.

Please cite this article as: Roux, C., et al., FluvialCorridor: A new ArcGIS toolbox package for multiscale riverscape exploration, Geomorphology
(2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.geomorph.2014.04.018

C. Roux et al. / Geomorphology xxx (2014) xxxxxx

Reaches 2 and 4 [196.8 m; 194.0 m]. A statistical analysis shows that the
two narrow reaches are also quite uniform in width. Actually, the
interquartile range (IQR) of WAC in Reaches 1 and 3 (i.e. respectively
22.4 m and 11.5 m) is signicantly lower than in the two others AGOs
(i.e. IQR(2) = 79.2 m and IQR(4) = 51.4 m). Those results are visually validated, both with the active channel layer and the orthophotos. It clearly
appears that Reaches 2 and 4 are braided reaches, with a high width variability and free to extend or laterally shift. Conversely, an embankment
layer from the Crateurs de Drme project conrms that Reaches 1 and 4
are conned by human infrastructures (i.e. embankments) resulting in a
quite uniform distribution of WAC.
5.4. Conclusion
The present organization is quite confusing because there are two
consecutive conclusion chapters (i.e. 6 and 7).I think the Chapter 6
"Conclusion" is not correctly located. This part of the paper refers to
the specic conclusions of the case study and so should be placed within
the chapter 5, as a sub-chapter 5.4."?>Actually, all the workows described above can be applied in a few hours depending on the study
area extent and the preliminary requirements, such as the selection of
input data and the empirical settings of parameters (e.g. the elevation
threshold for the valley bottom, the spatial disaggregation step). The
case study presented took about 20 min of computation. Also, presented
results could surely be improved by increasing the DGO-scale database
resolution, adjusting the criterion of the Hubert test or, certainly by
introducing other parameters (e.g. transversal slope threshold (Gallant
and Dowling, 2003)).
6. Discussion and conclusions
6.1. FluvialCorridor limitations
As it is still in development, the FluvialCorridor toolbox shows some
shortcomings. Geomatic or geometric limits are referenced within the
guidelines included with the package. One of them has already been introduced in Section 5.2 and deals with the limits of the spatial disaggregation processes, especially for polygon inputs. Currently and as
implemented in the package, with too highly curved centerlines,
Thiessen polygons used for the disaggregation do not cross the entire
input polygon. Thus, resulting DGOs can lead to problems during the
characterization of the DGO-scale database, as mentioned in the
methods section of the case study above. Similar issues occur at conuences which are very specic areas where the metric assessment can be
inconsistent (e.g. uvial widths, ecotones).
Moreover, methodological shortcomings about the multiscale potential of the package are also noticed. Problems can occur with some
tools used at a regional scale. Input parameters do not handle the inherent size effect of uvial longitudinal patterns. For example, in the case of
the Valley bottom tool, valley bottom extraction is done within a buffer, created around the different branches of the hydrographic network.
The buffer size is user-dened and constant over the entire study length.
Problems can therefore occur for upland areas, where the valley bottom,
which is generally narrower in headwater systems, can be searched for
within surrounding valleys. In order to avoid such problems, the buffer
size, and perhaps the elevation threshold used for the valley bottom definition, should be set for each stream of the network according to its
catchment area. This issue can be applied to other processes such as
the spatial disaggregation or aggregation and must be xed in the
next version.
Nevertheless, and as mentioned previously, the FluvialCorridor toolbox is still under development and geomatic and geometric weaknesses
remain infrequent. The package still provides robust tools and frameworks to enrich scientic studies or management plans and produces
consistent information from local to regional scales.

6.2. Other potential or derived metrics

The richness of the metrics characterization directly depends on the
set of available metrics. As shown in Fig. 1, the FluvialCorridor package
enables the user to calculate ten geomorphic or landscape metrics. Databases can also be characterized either by a combination of several
metrics or by importing data from external databases or processes.
The rst point is illustrated in the case study by the use of the connement index (Fig. 3C1) and in the theoretical workow (Fig. 1) where
we assessed the drainage density in the DGO2 as the ratio between
the cumulative stream length and the watershed area. External databases (e.g. ESTIMKART for the French territory (Lamouroux et al.,
2010), CORINE Land Cover for the European Union) can be joined to a
DGO-scale database to add information such as ows or channel
depth values, increasing the number of available and potential derived
metrics. External databases can also be created from external processes
and then joined to the attribute table of a DGOs layer (e.g. cumulative
eroded area from image and DEM analysis, Fig. 1). Possibilities are manifold and eld data can also be included when available. By joining several databases, one may access and investigate a very large range of
metrics.
6.3. Added value and further improvements
As mentioned in previous sections, the FluvialCorridor toolbox provides a complete and robust workow and offers multiple approaches
to characterizing uvial continuums and riverscapes.
Compared to the rst version, this toolbox provides many options to
explore the database. User-dened metrics allow a more tailored approach to the exploration of ones dataset, depending on the data available and the geographical context. For example, the Valley bottom
tool allows the operator to choose his/her own threshold in terms of elevation. The Stream network tool allows the user to choose the drainage area value (in km2) used to initiate the hydrographic network and
in the Hubert test tool, value is also chosen by the operator. As a
last example, the constant length used to the spatial disaggregation of
UGOs is a user-dened parameter.
Further improvements are projected. Major efforts are currently
under way to include imagery analysis tools. By integrating colored or
infra-red orthophotographs, the user will be able to access new
riverscape units (e.g. water bodies or backwaters, vegetated islands or
forest cover, bars, anthropogenic elements, etc.) according to a specic
research focus. Some others utilities are investigated such as a cluster
analysis module for exploring features typology after the spatial aggregation. Moreover, only one algorithm of aggregation (i.e. Hubert test) is
currently available. One of the future improvements will be to implement new statistical algorithms such as the multivariate Hidden Markov Models (Baum and Eagon, 1963; Mari et al., 2011). Finally, and
following the pioneer contributions of Tormos (2010), we plan to introduce new procedures to explore multiscale models, enabling the user to
predict local reach-scale metrics from upstream reach, network or
catchment characteristics.
6.4. A geomatic workow for answering different questions at a network scale
This paper can be viewed as a part of a larger work, initiated by Alber
and Pigay (2011), with a goal of developing a procedure to investigate
and characterize networks and riverscapes at a range of scales. The presented FluvialCorridor toolbox package goes beyond the simple conceptual and geomatic framework by providing an automated GIS tool. It can
therefore be used in other contexts to answer to other questions. Belletti
et al. (2012) and Notebaert and Piegay (2013) demonstrated that this
multiscale approach is powerful and operational both in research and
management contexts. The latter used the entire workow to show
that the scaling effect observed on the oodplain width of the Rhne
catchment is mainly controlled by lithological variations rather than

Please cite this article as: Roux, C., et al., FluvialCorridor: A new ArcGIS toolbox package for multiscale riverscape exploration, Geomorphology
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C. Roux et al. / Geomorphology xxx (2014) xxxxxx

by downstream distance. Bertrand et al. (2013) used this GIS package

and framework to assess the risks of environmental changes (i.e. in
terms of habitat diversity and trout distribution) induced by sediment
replenishment on the Drme River. Wiederkehr (2012) used the procedure to provide a typology of channel patterns (e.g. single-bed or multiple channels, braided, sinuous or straight channels) and compare this
level of organization with the in-channel features (e.g. the inter-pool
spacing) showing the two geomorphic organizations are not linked. A
running project is focused on sedimentation patterns in groyne elds.
Geomatic procedures are used to provide a typology of sedimentation
pattern according to the inter-groyne geometry and associated hydraulic conditions.
The FluvialCorridor package is therefore constantly being rened and
only V01 is presently available. Nevertheless, this rst version of the
FluvialCorridor toolbox has already been shown to be powerful enough
to explore riverscape features at reach to network scales from existing
vector and raster layers.
Acknowledgements
The authors wish to thank all the researchers who actively participated to the development of this research project, and notably B. Belletti,
L. Bourdin, S. Dufour, F. Libault, B. Notebaert, M. Rival, E. Wiederkehr,
and the different institutions who funded the projects: RMC Water Agency, SedAlp project (Alpine Space European Program). The authors also
kindly thank John C. Stella and Robin Jenkinson who reviewed the paper.
NB: the GIS toolbox, its guidelines and the database of the case study
are available online at http://umrevs-isig.fr.
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Please cite this article as: Roux, C., et al., FluvialCorridor: A new ArcGIS toolbox package for multiscale riverscape exploration, Geomorphology
(2014), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.geomorph.2014.04.018