Semester

Fall

Date of Graduation

2004

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Type

MS

College

Eberly College of Arts and Sciences

Department

Geology and Geography

Committee Chair

J. Steven Kite.

Abstract

An inventory and analysis of culverts as vertebrate migration barriers has been completed in a relatively pristine portion of the Upper Cheat River basin, Randolph and Tucker counties, West Virginia. Investigators in four different disciplines contributed to the project, including the geomorphological research represented by this thesis. This project had an underlying purpose to assess the potential for stream mitigation credits through a possible future stream mitigation banking program.;Several conditions appear correlated with problem culvert sites. Calvin high base substratum-Belmont-Meckesville soil association is associated with the greatest amounts of instability and aggradation at culvert sites. Three-quarters of the study area culverts appear undersized and cannot convey bankfull discharge events, which may be due to the lack of culvert design for smaller streams that pose less danger to human lives and adjacent property. Undersized culverts have sedimentation, blockage, and conveyance problems; 91 percent of aggraded reaches cannot convey a bankfull event. Upstream, downstream, and overall reach gradients are steeper than culvert gradients.

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