ABSTRACT
Four chapters in this Realization section show how research achievements on changing channels created a foundation for river channel management at the end of the twentieth century founded on an understanding that channels will continue to adjust within the lifetime of a management project. Investigations of river channel adjustments have to be seen in relation to river channel stability (4.1) and often occur in response to factors that apply at specific locations such as dams, or along reaches as in the case of channelization, or have occurred as a consequence of inchannel or land use related human impacts over major parts of the basin (4.2). Historical records and palaeohydrological data can inform understanding of channel change, which should also be related to how climate change has influenced channel adjustments (4.3). The world pattern of river channel change (4.4) has to be envisioned against the known complexity of river channel adjustments and several conceptual approaches have been devised to summarize change on a longer timescale (4.5), providing implications for river channel management (4.6).
