Supporting Data for Sediment Studies in the White River Watershed

The White River is a dynamic gravel-bedded system in western Washington, with headwaters on Mount Rainier. Chronic aggradation in the lower river has reduced flood conveyance to a point where modest discharges are increasingly causing substantial flood damage. In order to better understand the dynamics governing this aggradation, and how aggradation rates may be influenced by forecasted changes in climate, the USGS conducted a broad study looking at the watershed-scale delivery and routing of coarse sediment (sand and gravel). Those results have been published in a GSA Bulletin journal article (https://doi.org/10.1130/B35530.1). This data release consists of supporting data used in that product, and includes 1) Grain size distribution data for subsurface gravels in the main stem White River 2) Structure-from-Motion derived digital elevation models (DEMs) of the White and West Fork White Rivers, covering the areas within the National Park boundaries 3) DEMs of difference showing topographic change in the watershed over various intervals from 1979 to 2017 4) Scanned survey sheets of a 1907 survey of the lower White, Puyallup and Duwamish Valleys