Unpaved and native surfaced roads are critical in forest management for recreation, wildlife, and timber production. Forest road erosion accounts for the majority of erosion in forestlands. Road management for these forest areas receives increasing pressures to reduce the amount of erosion that occurs on forest roads to create the lowest impact on the environment and to keep our natural world as picturesque and untouched as possible.

While soil erosion is an inevitable and naturally occurring phenomenon, it is greatly accelerated by human interaction. In the future, this could potentially result in degraded water quality considering that forest watersheds are highly valuable in protecting and improving water. Increased land development / land use change can threaten the quality of water that flows through watersheds in the U.S. (Grace, 2008).

Sediment Sources and Yields in the Idaho Batholith

Sediment production to mountain rivers is essential to habitat formation for aquatic organisms, but also decreases reservoir capacity and increases flood risk near dams. Managing these different and sometimes conflicting uses of our rivers is further complicated by a poor understanding of the relative contributions of natural vs. anthropogenic sediment inputs and their likely responses to changing climatic conditions.

Briefing Paper

GRAIP- Quantifying and Prioritizing Road Impacts

The Geomorphic Road Assessment and Inventory Package (GRAIP) is a process and a set of tools for analyzing the impacts of roads on forested watersheds. GRAIP combines a road inventory with a powerful GIS analysis tool set to predict sediment production and delivery, mass wasting risk from gullies and landslides, stream diversion potential, culvert maintenance and fish passage at stream crossings.

Briefing Paper   |   GRAIP Website

Sediment Impacts From Debris Flows

Headwater basins periodically produce massive pulses of sediment to main stem rivers. Understanding how this sediment affects fluvial processes, aquatic habitats, and infrastructure along river corridors is key to allocating limited management resources.

Briefing Paper