Determination of bank erodibility for natural and anthropogenic bank materials using a model of lateral migration and observed erosion along the Willamette River,Oregon, USA

Many large rivers flow through a variety of geologic materials. Within the span of several kilometres, bends may alternately flow against recently reworked sediments, older, more indurated sediments or highly resistant materials. As sediment size, cementation, and other properties strongly influence the erodibility of river banks, erosion rates and channel planform are likely to vary significantly along the length of large rivers. In order to assess the role of bank materials on bank erosion rates, we develop a method for detecting relative differences in erodibility between bank materials along large floodplains. By coupling historic patterns of channel change with a simple model of bank erodibility we are able to track relative changes in bank erodibility among time intervals and bank materials. We apply our analysis to the upper Willamette River, in northwestern Oregon for three time periods: 1850–1895, 1895–1932 and 1972–1995 and compute relative differences in bank erodibility for Holocene alluvium, partially cemented Pleistocene gravels, and revetments constructed in the 20th century. Although the Willamette is fundamentally an anastomosing river, we apply the model to single‐thread portions of the channel that evolved through lateral migration. Our simple model of bank erodibility reveals that for all three‐time periods, banks composed of Holocene alluvium are at least 2–5 times more erodible than banks composed of Pleistocene gravels. Revetment installed in the 20th century is highly resistant to erosion and is at least 10 times less erodible than Pleistocene gravels. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.