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Flood inundation mapping data for Johnson Creek near Sycamore, Oregon

April 19, 2017

The basis for these features is U.S. Geological Survey Scientific Investigations Report 2017-5024 Flood Inundation Mapping Data for Johnson Creek near Sycamore, Oregon. The domain of the HEC-RAS hydraulic model is a 12.9-mile reach of Johnson Creek from just upstream of SE 174th Avenue in Portland, Oregon, to its confluence with the Willamette River. Some of the hydraulics used in the model were taken from Federal Emergency Management Agency, 2010, Flood Insurance Study, City of Portland, Oregon, Multnomah, Clackamas, and Washington Counties, Volume 1 of 3, November 26, 2010. The Digital Elevation Model (DEM) utilized for the project was developed from lidar data flown in 2015 and provided by the Oregon Department of Geology and Mineral Industries. Bridge decks are generally removed from DEMs as standard practice. Therefore, these features may be shown as inundated when they are not. Judgement should be used when estimating the usefulness of a bridge during flood flow. Comparing the bridge to the surrounding ground can be more informative in this respect than simply looking at the bridge itself. Two model plans were used in the creation of the flood layers. The first is a stable model plan using unsteady flow in which the maximum streamflow is held in place for a long period of time (a number of days) in order to replicate a steady model using an unsteady plan. The stable model plan produced the areas of uncertainty contained in the sycor_breach.shp shapefile. The second is an unstable model plan that uses unsteady flow in which the full hydrograph (rising and falling limb) is represented based on the hydrograph shape of the December 2015 peak annual flood. The unstable model plan produced the flood extent polygons contained in the sycor.shp shapefile and the depth rasters and represents the best estimate of flood inundation for the given streamflow at U.S. Geological Survey streamgage 14211500.

Publication Year 2017
Title Flood inundation mapping data for Johnson Creek near Sycamore, Oregon
DOI 10.5066/F75X273G
Authors Adam Stonewall, Benjamin Beal
Product Type Data Release
Record Source USGS Digital Object Identifier Catalog
USGS Organization Oregon Water Science Center