Power and politics: the case of urbanization and river channel change

Authors

Peter AshmoreFollow

Document Type

Presentation

Publication Date

2023

Abstract

Gradual urbanization of a watershed in Toronto, Canada, over 60+ years resulted in major channel changes. The temporal and spatial extent of channel widening are predictable from new analysis tracking changes in total stream power along the river system as urban land cover extended across the watershed, and also produced very high energy large flood events responsible for major channel change. The analysis is a geomorphically-satisfying, quasi-experimental test of theory of river channel change. But it misses important elements of the full trajectory of change that are not physically predictable. Treating urbanization as a neutral physical variable of changing watershed state that ‘just happens’ ignores the actual socio-political elements of power in urbanization and their impacts on the trajectory of geomorphological change. This includes the roles of various actors and events including, colonization, urban development policy, community attitudes to the river, forms of engineering intervention, and the role of epistemic communities engaged in mitigation, restoration and setting the future of the river system. I suggest that we need forms of political geomorphology to question processes of geomorphic change and management, and to extend the benefits of epistemological inclusion.

Notes

Poster presentation at British Society for Geomorphology Annual Conference. Edinburgh, Scotland. September 2023.

Citation of this paper:

Ashmore, P. 2023. Power and politics: the case of urbanization and river channel change. British Society for Geomorphology Annual Conference. Edinburgh, Scotland, September 2023,.