CHAPTER 10 DYNAMIC WAVE ROUTING The propagation of flow in space and time through a river or a network of rivers is a complex problem. The desire to build and live along rivers creates the necessity for accurate calculation of water levels and flow rates and provides the impetus to develop complex flow routing models, such as dynamic wave models. Another impetus for developing dynamic wave models is the need for more accurate hydrologic simulation, in particular, simulation of flow in urban watersheds and storm drainage systems. The dynamic wave model can also be used for routing low flows through rivers or irrigation channels to provide better control of water distribution. The propagation of flow along a river channel or an urban drainage system is an unsteady nonuniform flow, unsteady because it varies in time, nonuniform because flow properties such as water surface elevation, velocity, and discharge are not constant along the channel. One-dimensional distributed routing methods have been classified in Chap. 9 as kinematic wave routing, diffusion wave routing, and dynamic wave routing Kinematic waves govern the flow when the inertial and pressure forces are not important, that is, when the gravitational force of the flow is balanced by the frictional resistance force. Chapter 9 demonstrated that the kinematic wave approximation is useful for applications where the channel slopes are steep and backwater effects are negligible. When pressure forces become important but inertial forces remain unimportant, a diffusion wave model is applicable. Both the kinematic wave model and the diffusion wave model are helpful in describing downstream wave propagation when the channel slope is greater than about 0.5 fi/mi (0.01 percent) and there are no waves propagating upstream due to 310Dywamic WAVE ROUTING 311 disturbances such as tides, tributary inflows, or reservoir operations. When both inertial and pressure forces are important, such as in mild-sloped rivers, and backwater effects from downstream disturbances are not negligible, then both the inertial force and pressure force terms in the momentum equation are needed. Under these circumstances the dynamic wave routing method is required, which involves numerical solution of the full Saint-Venant equations. Dynamic routing was first used by Stoker (1953) and by Isaacson, Stoker, and Troesch (1954, 1956) in their pioneering investigation of flood routing for the Ohio River. This chapter describes the theoretical development of dynamic wave routing models using implicit finite-difference approximations to solve the Saint-Venant equations. 10.1 DYNAMIC STAGE-DISCHARGE RELATIONSHIPS The momentum equation is written in the conservation form [from (9.1.33)] as wee!) (2 2 So +S¢ +Se}— Bare + WB=0 (10.1.1) Uniform flow occurs when the bed slope S, is equal to the friction slope S; and all other terms are negligible, so that the relationship between discharge, or flow rate, and stage height, or water surface elevation, is a single-valued function derived from Manning's equation, as shown by the uniform flow rating curve in Fig. 10.1.1. When other terms in the momentum equation are not negligible, the stage-discharge relationship forms a loop as shown by the outer curve in Fig. 10.1.1, because the depth or stage is not just a function of discharge, but also a function of a variable energy slope. For a given stage, the discharge is usually higher on the rising limb of a flood hydrograph than on the recession limb, As the discharge rises and falls, the rating curve may even exhibit multiple loops as shown in Fig. 10.1.2 for the Red River (Fread, 1973c). The rating curve for uniform flow is typical of lumped or hydrologic routing methods in which (Kinematic wave tnd ent lumped routing moses) | ‘anpcuve Recession Stage <__Loop rating curve / (Dynamic and fl diffusion wave models) Rising! i FIGURE 10.1.1 Loop rating curves. The uniform flow rating curve does not reflect backwater effects, whereas the Discharge looped curve does.312. appuieo HYDROLOGY 60 4 Stage A (ft) “Tine ays) 0 20 40 0 80 100 120 Discharge (1000 cfs) © Observed = — Computed FIGURE 10.1.2 Looped stage-discharge relation for the Red River, Alexandria, Louisiana (May S-June 17, 1964. Source: Fread, 1973c) 5 = f(Q), while the loop rating curve is typical of distributed or hydraulic routing methods Flow propagation in natural rivers is complicated by several factors: junc- tions and tributaries, variations in cross section, variations in resistance as a function both of flow depth and of location along the river, inundated areas, and meandering of the river. The interaction between the main channel and the flood plain or inundated valley is one of the most important factors affecting flood propagation, During the rising part of a flood wave, water flows into the flood plain or valley from the main channel, and during the falling flood, water flows from the inundated valley back into the main channel. The effect of the valley storage is to decrease the discharge during the falling flood. Also, some losses occur in the valley due to infiltration and evaporation. ‘The flood plain has an effect on the wave celerity because the flood wave progresses more slowly in the inundated valley than in the main channel of a river. This difference in wave celerities disperses the flood wave and causes flow from the main channel to the flood plain during the rising flood by creating a transverse water surface slope away from the channel. During the falling flood, the transverse slope is inward from the inundated valley into the main channel and water then moves from the flood plain back into the main channel (see Fig 10.1.3(a) and (6)}. Because the longitudirial axes of the main channel and the flood plain valley are rarely parallel, the situstion described above is even more complicated in a