Conference Papers

Litter along Lousiana's beaches has become a well-recognized problem. In September 1987, Louisiana's first statewide beach cleanup attracted about 3300 volunteers who filled 16,000 bags with trash collected along 15 beaches. An estimated 800,173 items were gathered. Forty percent of the items were made of plastic and 11% were of polystyrene. Of all the litter collected, 37% was beverage-related. L

In common with most branches of science, the management of riverine fish populations is characterised by reductionist and isolationist philosophies. Traditional fish management focuses on stocking and controls on fishing. This paper presents a consensus of scientists involved in the LARS workshop on the management of fish populations in large rivers. A move towards a more holistic philosophy is ad

This abstract refers to technical recommendations for avoiding, minimizing, and restoring (i.e., mitigating) drilling site access impacts related to oil and gas activities in coastal wetlands through regulatory review, drawing mostly from the Louisiana experience. The two standard methods used to access wetland drilling locations are canals and roads, both of which require dredging. Each access me

Five tracer runs were performed on a detention pond and wetlands system to determine mixing and residence times in the system. The data indicate that at low discharges and with large amounts of storage, the pond is moderately mixed with residence times not much less than the theoretical maximum possible under complete mixing. At higher discharges and with less storage in the pond, short-circuiting

The City of Austin, Texas, has played a pioneering role in the control of urban nonpoint source pollution by enacting watershed and stormwater ordinances, overseeing detailed monitoring programs, and improving design criteria for stormwater control methods. The effectiveness of the methods used in Austin, and perhaps in other areas of the United States, to protect urban water resources has not yet

Three hurricanes hit Lousiana (LA), Mississippi (MS), Alabama (AL), and the Florida (FL) panhandle in 1985, producing dramatic geomorphic changes in a wide variety of coastal environments. The impact zone for hurricanes Danny, Elena, and Juan stretched 1000 km between the Sabine River in LA to the Apalachicola River in FL. Barrier shorelines experienced repeated intense overwash events, producing

A relation for rapidly predicting the peak outflow rate from a breached embankment dam has been presented. The prediction equation is based on reliable data from 19 embankment dam failures and requires as input the volume of water in the reservoir at the time a breach begins to form, and the estimated height of the final breach. Peak outflow predicted by the equation can be used with simplified fl

Satellite telemetry technology has been used during field studies of polar bears in Alaska since 1985. A total of 109 Platform Transmitter Terminals (PTT) have been deployed on free-ranging female polar bears that seasonally inhabit waters adjacent to the Alaskan coast. The PTTs transmitted locational and sensor data to TIROS-N polar-orbiting satellites during a duty cycle of 12 hours on/60 hours

Work is underway on a planned microcomputer program that will include about 1500 prediction equations for 214 flood regions of the United States and Puerto Rico. The program will include calculation routines for rural and urban flood frequency and hydrograph characteristics and will have links to a detention-pond routing model.

Analysis of the results of repeat quantitative dye traces between a sinkhole and a spring used for public water supply were used to describe predictive relations between discharge, mean travel time, apparent ground-water flow velocity and solute transport characteristics. Normalized peak concentration, mean travel time, and standard deviation of travel times were used to produce a dimensionless, c

A hydrodynamic modeling study of the effects of freshwater inflow on circulation and mixing in San Francisco Bay has been underway since 1985. This paper describes the multidimensional hydrodynamic models being used on the study and review recent progress with their applications. Particular modeling considerations for San Francisco Bay and future modeling plans are discussed.

A set of strong motion records was obtained from the base-isolated Santa Ana River Pipeline Bridge during the magnitude 5.9 Whittier Narrows, California, earthquake of October 1, 1987. The analysis of the records show that the level of excitation was not strong enough to fully activate the base isolators. The dominant modes of the response are the translations of the abutment-bridge-pipe system in