**1. Introduction**

In the USA, watershed and site hydrology water quality modeling and runoff volume predictions made rapid advances in the 1960s and 1970s. By the 1980s, investigators could reliably predict both the volume and the quality of water runoff. However, this ability and technology

© 2016 The Author(s). Licensee InTech. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. © 2018 The Author(s). Licensee IntechOpen. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

has only slowly been adapted in other parts of the world. Nevertheless, such concerns have been of interest by humans for many millennia. Luo et al. describes concerns in managing the Yellow River in China, 5000 years ago, and more recent concerns in Japan [1]. The natural landscape was reconfigured with massive hill removals and topographic changes thought to reduce the impacts of flooding.

many respects by the end of World War II, the fundamentals of site hydrology and erosion control had been established for American landscapes. The effort was made possible because of the national rainfall data collected by the US Department of Agriculture across the country and various investigators had studied runoff percentages for numerous soils and cover types. Civil engineers now could predict estimated water flow for various types of storm events.

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The understanding concerning the impacts to changes in watersheds was investigated. In the American West, the Mono Lake Basin illustrated the impacts of water removal to southern California [5]. Watershed hydrology was considered at the ecosystem level. The Colorado River was a case study in watershed ecosystems, as most of the water is harvested and very little flows out of the delta through Mexico [6]. Other investigators discovered large cataclysmic events, such as the massive great floods across western Washington during the end of the last ice age [7]. Ice dams blocked rivers, releasing water at an estimated 9.46 cubic miles per hour traveling at 58 miles per hour. The flow of water was over 10 times the flow of water in the world and 60 times great than the flow of water in the Amazon. It is estimated that this event may have occurred at least 40 times. Knowledge built concerning low- and high-water

Refinements and modifications in planning and design continued. Albe Munson, a Professor at Michigan State University, both a landscape architect and a civil engineer, wrote the first noted American landscape construction book integrating site hydrology and landscape development [8]. Yet the book contained only simple estimates for yearly runoff. However, others later presented more usable equations to estimate pond sizing, pipe sizing, and swale sizing [9, 10]. Eventually extensive and quite comprehensive publications featured a wide array of knowledge in planning and design concerning water for landscape architects and engineers [11–13]. Soil scientists and hydrologists continued refinements in hydrological calculations. They considered models that were more reflective of field conditions such as saturated soil and frozen soil. Today, site hydrology calculations are more complicated than in the past with several

The integration of land use, human activities, and the forces of nature are being examined in a more integrated manner. The recent publication of a book titled *Third Coast Atlas: Prelude to a Plan*, illustrates this integration [15] The third coast is the coastline of the Great Lakes system and St. Lawrence seaway. It is longer than either the Atlantic Coast or Pacific Coast. Humans are attempting to integrate both large-scale issues and small-site detailed features in a more

One topic that has taken some time to develop was the prediction of water quality. By the late 1970s and early 1980s progress was made as investigators understood that the nutrients of phosphorus and nitrogen at excessive levels in the water reduced water quality. Wang (et al.) recently published an overview of this prediction approach where investigators are now attempting to develop treatments to intercede upon water quality [16]. The essential feature concerning improving water quality is to have the water come in contact with the substrate that removes the nutrient (phosphorus or nitrogen) from the liquid. Large volumes of standing water not in contact with the substrate will only be marginally treated. In addition,

events and activities.

methods and choices [14].

comprehensive manner.

In Western Anatolia (Western Turkey), American environmental interest was invigorated by George Perkins Marsh (1805–1882). He wrote *Man and Nature: of Physical Geography as Modified by Human Action* [2]. He was stationed as an Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire. During his travels, he learned about the Meander River, a winding river in Western Turkey. Especially during the Greek and Roman eras, he learned about the deforestation of the surrounding hills and the ensuing erosion that expanded the Meander River's delta into the Mediterranean Sea (**Figure 1**) [3]. Along with his other observations in Europe, he developed his ideas about landscape stewardship. There was great concern that such adverse environmental impacts should not occur in North America. Individuals such as Gifford Pinchot developed a land management ethic and worked with Frederick Law Olmsted at Biltmore where Olmsted established the bass ponds to control soil erosion from the large construction site [3]. Today erosions control and detention ponds are commonplace.

French, English, German, Russian, and American engineers were engaged in developing methods and mathematical models to predict water flow in pipes, culverts, sewers, swales, creeks, and rivers culminating in such books as *Design Data Book for Civil Engineers* [4]. In

**Figure 1.** An image of the Meander River valley between the ancient Greek cities of Priene and Melitus. Both cities were Mediterranean ports during Greek Ionian times. Today the Mediterranean Sea in the figure is many miles to the right of the image (copyright 2006 Jon Bryan Burley, all rights reserved, used by Permission).

many respects by the end of World War II, the fundamentals of site hydrology and erosion control had been established for American landscapes. The effort was made possible because of the national rainfall data collected by the US Department of Agriculture across the country and various investigators had studied runoff percentages for numerous soils and cover types. Civil engineers now could predict estimated water flow for various types of storm events.

has only slowly been adapted in other parts of the world. Nevertheless, such concerns have been of interest by humans for many millennia. Luo et al. describes concerns in managing the Yellow River in China, 5000 years ago, and more recent concerns in Japan [1]. The natural landscape was reconfigured with massive hill removals and topographic changes thought to

In Western Anatolia (Western Turkey), American environmental interest was invigorated by George Perkins Marsh (1805–1882). He wrote *Man and Nature: of Physical Geography as Modified by Human Action* [2]. He was stationed as an Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire. During his travels, he learned about the Meander River, a winding river in Western Turkey. Especially during the Greek and Roman eras, he learned about the deforestation of the surrounding hills and the ensuing erosion that expanded the Meander River's delta into the Mediterranean Sea (**Figure 1**) [3]. Along with his other observations in Europe, he developed his ideas about landscape stewardship. There was great concern that such adverse environmental impacts should not occur in North America. Individuals such as Gifford Pinchot developed a land management ethic and worked with Frederick Law Olmsted at Biltmore where Olmsted established the bass ponds to control soil erosion from the large construction site [3]. Today

French, English, German, Russian, and American engineers were engaged in developing methods and mathematical models to predict water flow in pipes, culverts, sewers, swales, creeks, and rivers culminating in such books as *Design Data Book for Civil Engineers* [4]. In

**Figure 1.** An image of the Meander River valley between the ancient Greek cities of Priene and Melitus. Both cities were Mediterranean ports during Greek Ionian times. Today the Mediterranean Sea in the figure is many miles to the right of

the image (copyright 2006 Jon Bryan Burley, all rights reserved, used by Permission).

reduce the impacts of flooding.

264 Land Use - Assessing the Past, Envisioning the Future

erosions control and detention ponds are commonplace.

The understanding concerning the impacts to changes in watersheds was investigated. In the American West, the Mono Lake Basin illustrated the impacts of water removal to southern California [5]. Watershed hydrology was considered at the ecosystem level. The Colorado River was a case study in watershed ecosystems, as most of the water is harvested and very little flows out of the delta through Mexico [6]. Other investigators discovered large cataclysmic events, such as the massive great floods across western Washington during the end of the last ice age [7]. Ice dams blocked rivers, releasing water at an estimated 9.46 cubic miles per hour traveling at 58 miles per hour. The flow of water was over 10 times the flow of water in the world and 60 times great than the flow of water in the Amazon. It is estimated that this event may have occurred at least 40 times. Knowledge built concerning low- and high-water events and activities.

Refinements and modifications in planning and design continued. Albe Munson, a Professor at Michigan State University, both a landscape architect and a civil engineer, wrote the first noted American landscape construction book integrating site hydrology and landscape development [8]. Yet the book contained only simple estimates for yearly runoff. However, others later presented more usable equations to estimate pond sizing, pipe sizing, and swale sizing [9, 10]. Eventually extensive and quite comprehensive publications featured a wide array of knowledge in planning and design concerning water for landscape architects and engineers [11–13].

Soil scientists and hydrologists continued refinements in hydrological calculations. They considered models that were more reflective of field conditions such as saturated soil and frozen soil. Today, site hydrology calculations are more complicated than in the past with several methods and choices [14].

The integration of land use, human activities, and the forces of nature are being examined in a more integrated manner. The recent publication of a book titled *Third Coast Atlas: Prelude to a Plan*, illustrates this integration [15] The third coast is the coastline of the Great Lakes system and St. Lawrence seaway. It is longer than either the Atlantic Coast or Pacific Coast. Humans are attempting to integrate both large-scale issues and small-site detailed features in a more comprehensive manner.

One topic that has taken some time to develop was the prediction of water quality. By the late 1970s and early 1980s progress was made as investigators understood that the nutrients of phosphorus and nitrogen at excessive levels in the water reduced water quality. Wang (et al.) recently published an overview of this prediction approach where investigators are now attempting to develop treatments to intercede upon water quality [16]. The essential feature concerning improving water quality is to have the water come in contact with the substrate that removes the nutrient (phosphorus or nitrogen) from the liquid. Large volumes of standing water not in contact with the substrate will only be marginally treated. In addition, measures to limit the nutrients from entering free-flowing water in the hydrological system are also very effective and reduce the need for water treatment basins.

findings of various studies undertaken by my students and myself over the past decade. The one that was published is a little known article published by the American Society of Landscape Architects, describing a study concerning how much development could occur within the Lake Itasca watershed (the headwaters of the Mississippi River) to protect the lake's water quality," added Dr. Burley [19]. The article presents a graph of water quality based upon various land cover environments: 100% forested watershed, a catastrophic fire event, unchecked development and, limited development. The development was limited to keep the lake a meso-trophic lake. "Students could develop land-use plans containing various levels of forested land, agricultural land, low density rural housing, and urban land. I thought this was an excellent landscape planning exercise for students to relate development, land

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"During this time, I submitted a research article to a journal about the Sauk River watershed in Minnesota, where I had conducted a 1983 study statistically validating the prediction modeling process (originally using hand drawn overlays and a planimeter, but updated in the mid-1980s and replicated with a micro-computer geographical information systems (GIS) application), illustrating the concordance of actual water quality measures with predicted estimates by dividing the watershed into sub-watersheds and comparing measured and predicted scores. And while the results were publishable (no reviewer disputed the findings) and no investigator had ever done this before, by the time I had submitted the manuscript, the GIS technology had radically changed (from mostly hand drawn overlay maps measured with a planimeter, to crude computer maps with over-printing of alpha- numeric characters, to digital colored GIS maps—and the GIS world had changed). The manuscript was rejected for its dated technology, with the reviewers stating that there were better and newer landscape planning tools. They were correct, but I had not interest in updating the research with newer technology that did not change the fundamental results," recalled Dr. Burley. "Reviewers can find numerous reasons to reject an abundance of submitted articles. Journals have reputations to maintain and that may mean not presenting dated technology. Still the fundamentals of that study remain true," confided Dr. Burley. This study of the Sauk River Watershed illustrates the methodology for this investigation. "I am pleased that the Sauk River watershed study conducted in 1983 still has some value and portions of the study can be employed in some useful fashion," added Dr. Burley. "I also want people to recognize the great value and contributions that people like Carlson, Garn, and Parrott made; otherwise it would have been impossible to model the watershed and make any prediction," suggested Dr. Burley [17, 18].

An overview of fundamental methodology is illustrated by a study on the Sauk River, Minnesota, conducted in the 1980s. The Sauk River is in central Minnesota on the border between the Western prairie lands and the Eastern woodlands. Before emptying into the Mississippi River, the water passes through Cedar Island Lake. This lake has experienced algae blooms and diminished water quality. Recreational housing along the lake was blamed

management, and natural resource protection," reflected Dr. Burley.

**2. Methodology**

**2.1. Sauk River Watershed, Minnesota**

Two important seminal developments occurred in search to predict non-toxic water quality. Much of this work was conducted in Minnesota and Wisconsin, the USA, where there are thousands of lakes to study and manage. The first development was the recognition that nitrogen ions and suspended phosphorus in the water were key limiting nutrients influencing water quality. Investigators could approximate the amount of these nutrients in the water by simply placing a Secchi disk in the water and determining the depth at which the disk disappeared. The quicker it disappeared under the water, the more nutrient rich was the water and the poorer was the water quality [17]. The second development was the ability to assign phosphorus contributions to free-moving water by the land area and land cover type. By combining these contributions from the land to the hydrological calculations of water flowing through a watershed, the concentration of phosphorus in the water on a yearly basis could be estimated [18]. It was a long series of equations to estimate water quality, with each variable having a fair amount of variance. The reliability of such a series of equations to predict water quality was at first suspect because it was believed that the accuracy of each section of the equations could lead to a highly inaccurate prediction. However, as we introduce in the methodology and results sections, the set of equations produced a relatively accurate estimation of water quality for a water body.

Our intent in this investigation is to illustrate how this environmental prediction methodology is applied to management watershed in the states of Michigan (Rainbow Lake and Minnesota (Sauk River Watershed), the USA. In addition, the chapter discusses how the quest to manage water in rural and urban environments continues in parts of the world, employing two examples from the People's Republic of China (PRC). The chapter also includes statements and comments from an interview (May 2017) of Dr. Jon Bryan Burley, FASLA, a landscape architect who has been engaged in teaching and writing academic papers concerning landscape for over 40 years. He has witnessed the evolving changes in this technology over this time period.

"When I was a young professor at age 27 in 1982, modeling watershed quality in Minnesota was just becoming possible," recalls Dr. Burley. "I used to have students in my landscape planning classes model land-use development within watersheds for selected lakes and prepare land-use plans to prevent a change in the perceived water quality of that lake. The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources provided publically available information concerning land cover and water quality in the state. Combined with information about rainfall and evapotranspiration, it was possible to estimate potential water quality changes due to changes in the landscape," describes Dr. Burley. "In 1990, when I went to the University of Michigan to work on my PhD this type of watershed modeling was considered as a possible topic for my dissertation. But in discussions with faculty at the School of Natural Resources, such a topic seemed far too ecologically complex to produce a meaningful dissertation. They seemed to be weary of such a long series of equations to predict water quality. I certainly understand their caution. Their concern was that if a series of 10 equations each could only explain 80% of the variance, then by the 10th equation (80% of 80% repeated ten times), the results maybe explaining less than 10% of the variance," expressed Dr. Burley. "So I pursued another topic, addressing surface mine reclamation and in the meantime, I attempted to communicate the findings of various studies undertaken by my students and myself over the past decade. The one that was published is a little known article published by the American Society of Landscape Architects, describing a study concerning how much development could occur within the Lake Itasca watershed (the headwaters of the Mississippi River) to protect the lake's water quality," added Dr. Burley [19]. The article presents a graph of water quality based upon various land cover environments: 100% forested watershed, a catastrophic fire event, unchecked development and, limited development. The development was limited to keep the lake a meso-trophic lake. "Students could develop land-use plans containing various levels of forested land, agricultural land, low density rural housing, and urban land. I thought this was an excellent landscape planning exercise for students to relate development, land management, and natural resource protection," reflected Dr. Burley.

"During this time, I submitted a research article to a journal about the Sauk River watershed in Minnesota, where I had conducted a 1983 study statistically validating the prediction modeling process (originally using hand drawn overlays and a planimeter, but updated in the mid-1980s and replicated with a micro-computer geographical information systems (GIS) application), illustrating the concordance of actual water quality measures with predicted estimates by dividing the watershed into sub-watersheds and comparing measured and predicted scores. And while the results were publishable (no reviewer disputed the findings) and no investigator had ever done this before, by the time I had submitted the manuscript, the GIS technology had radically changed (from mostly hand drawn overlay maps measured with a planimeter, to crude computer maps with over-printing of alpha- numeric characters, to digital colored GIS maps—and the GIS world had changed). The manuscript was rejected for its dated technology, with the reviewers stating that there were better and newer landscape planning tools. They were correct, but I had not interest in updating the research with newer technology that did not change the fundamental results," recalled Dr. Burley. "Reviewers can find numerous reasons to reject an abundance of submitted articles. Journals have reputations to maintain and that may mean not presenting dated technology. Still the fundamentals of that study remain true," confided Dr. Burley. This study of the Sauk River Watershed illustrates the methodology for this investigation. "I am pleased that the Sauk River watershed study conducted in 1983 still has some value and portions of the study can be employed in some useful fashion," added Dr. Burley. "I also want people to recognize the great value and contributions that people like Carlson, Garn, and Parrott made; otherwise it would have been impossible to model the watershed and make any prediction," suggested Dr. Burley [17, 18].
