Inventory, Monitoring
and Assessment of
Sediment Risks from
Forest Roads
Charles Luce
Tom Black
US Forest Service
Research and Development
Rocky Mountain Research Sta.
Interstates: 47,000 mi
All Nat’l Highways: 159,000 mi
FS Roads: 375,000 mi
Regulatory
Context
ESA
Clean Water Act
• TMDL
• NPDES?
Not all roads are
the same
Most Sediment from Few Places
100%
NFS, OR
90%
BV, ID
% Sediment Delivery
80%
NFJD, OR
MFP, ID
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
0%
2%
4%
6%
8%
10%
% of Active Drain Points
12%
14%
What is GRAIP?
• Geomorphic Roads Analysis and Inventory
Package
– A detailed road inventory procedure
– A set of GIS tools to analyze road-related
risks
What is GRAIP?
• Geomorphic Roads Analysis and Inventory
Package
– A detailed road inventory procedure
– A set of GIS tools to analyze road-related
risks
Road Network Hydrology
Road Segment
Two flow paths
• Roads
– Surface type
– Flowpath
vegetation
• Drain Points
– Nine types
– Stream connection
Drain
Point
Drain
Point
Local Calibration Data
Black & Luce, 2013
Gully Risks
0.8
0.6
0.4
0.2
0.0
Probability of Gully
1.0
SF Payette R.
-1
0
1
Log LS
Rd Segment Length
Slope below road
2
2
1.0
1.0
0.8
0.8
MF Willamette
0.4
0.0
0.0
0.2
0.2
0.4
P Gully
0.6
0.6
Probability of Gully
SF Boise
-0.5
0.0
0.5
1.0
2.0
0.01
1
10
100
ESI
2
Skykomish
0.8
0.8
0.4
0.0
0.0
0.2
0.2
0.4
P Gully
0.6
0.6
SF Skokomish
P Gully
0.1
1.0
1.0
Log LS
1.5
0.1
1
10
ESI
100
0.3
1
3.2
10
ESI
31.6
100
Other Risks
•
•
•
•
Culvert Demise
Overtopping
Stream Capture
Jammer Road Failure
GRAIP-Lite
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
Wall Ck
NF Siuslaw
Bear Valley
Seeley Lk
MF Payette
SF Salmon
0.0
Probability of Connection
1.0
• Transportation Layer
• Delivery Curves
• Maint-Level
Correlations
0
200
400
600
Distance to Stream (m)
800
1000
Application to 42 12th Digit HUCS
Nash-Sutcliffe R2=0.93
GRAIP: Scaling Effort & Info
Density
Uncalibrated
GRAIP_Lite
Calibrated
GRAIP_Lite
GRAIP
Line presence
Transportation
Layer Data
Transportation
Layer Data
DEM
Slope
Streams
DEM
Slope
Streams
GPS Roads
Surfacing
Existence
Condition
GPS Drainpoints
Type
Location
Condition
Connection
DEM
Slope
Streams
Improved
Vegetation
& Delivery
Erodibility
Varying Levels of Information
Percent of Sediment Delivered
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
0
10
20
30
Road Density
40
50
60
Percent of Road
GRAIP_Lite
70
GRAIP
80
90
100
GRAIP Examples I:
Watershed Analysis
1. TMDLs
2. CFLRP
The gold stars
Bear Valley Creek TMDL/4b
Fine
Coarse
Connection to Instream Metrics
Wall Creek and NF Siuslaw
RBS –
Monitoring framework
proposed by Oregon DEQ
Southwest Crown of
Continent CFLRP
GNLCC funded project
to understand
relationship between fish
habitat and road erosion
Graph courtesy of Robert Al-Chokachy, USGS Bozeman
GRAIP Examples II:
Legacy Roads
Monitoring Program
Tracking progress on
water quality goals
Post-Treatment
Control
4 miles
each
PreTreatment
PostTreatment
Control
Legacy Road Monitoring Project – Initial Effects
Initial Treatment Effects
Decommissioned Roads
SDRR Roads
n=11 segments, 67.7 km
n=12 segments, 86.3 km
Road-Stream
Hydrologic
Connectivity
-9.8 km, reduced from 16.9 to
7.1 km (-58%)
-2.3 km, reduced from 24.9 to
22.6 km (-9%)
Fine Sediment
Delivery
-119 Mg/yr, reduced from 187 to
67 Mg/yr (-64%)
-119 Mg/yr, reduced from 235 to
116 Mg/yr (-51%)
Drainpoint
Problem Rate
Reduced from 22% to 3%
(-86%)
Reduced from 25% to 14%
(-48%)
Unit Sediment -1.8 Mg/yr/km, reduced from 2.8 to -1.4 Mg/yr/km, reduced from 2.7 to
1.0 Mg/yr/km (-64%)
1.3 Mg/yr/km (-51%)
Delivery
Improving Efficiency
• Cost=Unit Cost X Percent treated X
Total Road Mileage
$1,200,000 Restoration Project
GRAIP
Survey:$135,000
Treatment:$1,065,000
Miles treated: 43
% Treated: 7.3%
Sediment Reduced: 71%
Non-GRAIP
Survey:$0
Treatment:$1,200,000
Miles treated; 48
% Treated: 8.2%
Sediment Reduced: 29%
Improving Efficiency
Percent of Total Delivered Sediment
100%
80%
60%
40%
20%
GRAIP
Road Density
0%
0%
20%
40%
60%
Percent of Total Road Length
Road lines
GRAIP_Lite
R1-R4
80%
100%
Watershed Condition Framework
Climate Change
Asessments
“This tool is used throughout our region when working
with collaboratives, partners, NEPA projects, and
landscape level analysis to determine where road
work needs to be conducted. …
This helps with our biological assessments we submit
to Fish and Wildlife Service for concerns on different
listed fish species. It also helps in our analysis of the
projects.”
-Faye Krueger
R1 Regional Forester
Brian Staab
R6 Regional Hydrologist
Portland, OR
Who benefits from GRAIP?
The Agency and Department
Demonstrates that we know what is going on with one of our most
substantial capital assets and a potentially severe source of water
pollution.
Faster NEPA!
EPA
Other Partners
The Manager in the Middle
District and Forest Specialists
IM&A Goals & Objectives
Goal 1: Support effective decision-making by providing relevant and credible
information.
• Priority management questions and related core information
• Integration and scalability of IM&A information
• Based on relevant science
• Quality and consistency of information
• Information is timely and accessible
Goal 2: Ensure that all IM&A activities are inclusive and comprehensive.
• Understand partner and stakeholder interests
• Address shared information needs.
• Address issues across organizational and geographic boundaries.
Goal 3: Ensure the IM&A system is responsive and adaptive to change.
• Establish and maintain a dynamic IM&A system that supports
management and is responsive to social, economic, and ecological
change.
• Ensure the IM&A system is responsive and adaptive to changing agency
capacity.