Abstract
Integrating Groundwater and Surface Water in GIS: Rio Grande
Track: Water Resources
Author(s): Julie Coonrod, Kelly Isaacson, Venkatesh Merwade
Human understanding of surface/ground water interaction is primarily defined by point measurements: stream gages measure water surface elevation at limited river cross sections; wells measure the groundwater elevation at a series of points. This paper presents an ArcGIS based model to meaningfully interpolate these point measurements to create a continuous water surface. This model is demonstrated with an 11 mile reach of the Rio Grande in Albuquerque, NM. A HEC-RAS model built in ArcGIS is used to interpolate the river surface measurements. The HEC-RAS generated surfaces are combined with high density groundwater measurements and riverside drain stage measurements in ArcGIS. The combined ground-river water surface is used with a LiDAR terrain model to calculate depth to groundwater. This process creates a tool that predicts depth to groundwater as a function of river discharge, allowing for further riparian area analyses.
Julie Coonrod
University of New Mexico
MSC01 1070, Civil Engineering
Albuquerque , New Mexico 87131
United States
Phone: 505-553-4354
E-mail: jcoonrod@unm.edu
Kelly Isaacson
University of New Mexico
MSC01 1070
Albuquerque , New Mexico 87131
United States
Phone: 505-277-1826
E-mail: kisaac@unm.edu
Venkatesh Merwade
Purdue University
550 Stadium Mall Drive
School of Civil Engineering
West Lafayette , Indiana 47906
United States
Phone: 765-494-2176
E-mail: vmerwade@purdue.edu