Meandering process and river valleys development

Abstract

A scheme of incised meandering channel evolution is introduced. The river valley's sinuosity, and valley meanders in particular, are of polygenetic nature. Their development is based on the meandering process which results (in the course of geological time) in valley asymmetry and local broadening of valley near the incised meanders bend and later in the incised channel transformation and development of a valley with a broad floodplain. Various types of valley bends are considered. A relationship is established between the meanders dimensions and bedload size.