A Geomorphological Regionalization using the Upscaled DEM: the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Area, China Case Study

Abstract

Characterizing geomorphological patterns based on digital elevation models (DEMs) has become a basic focus of current geomorphology. A new DEM upscaling method based on the high-accuracy surface modelling method (HASM-US method) has been developed to improve the accuracy of current models and the subjectivity of macroscopic geomorphological patterns. The topographic variables of elevation (EL), slope (SL), aspect (AS), relief amplitude (RA), surface incision (SI), surface roughness (SR), and profile curvature (PC) with a spatial resolution of 1 km × 1 km in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei (BTH) area of China have been obtained by using the HASM-US method combined with the principal component analysis (PCA) method in terms of the elevation data of the SRTM-4 DEM, meteorological station location information, and field measurements with a GPS receiver. A geomorphological regionalization pattern has been developed to quantitatively classify the geomorphological types in the BTH area by combining the seven topographic factors of EL, SL, AS, RA, SI, SR, and PC that have significant spatial variation. The results show that the upscaling accuracy of elevation (mean difference only −2.32 m) with the HASM-US method is higher than that with the bilinear interpolation method and nearest neighbour interpolation method. The geomorphologic distribution in the BTH area includes 11 types: low plain, low tableland, low hill, low basin, middle plain, middle hill, low mountain with low RA values, low mountain with medium RA values, middle mountain with low RA values, middle mountain with medium RA values, and middle mountain with high RA values. The low plain is the dominant geomorphological type that covers 40.58% of the whole BTH area. The geomorphological distribution shows the different significant characteristics: the elevation rapidly decreases from the Taihang Mountains to the eastern area, gradually decreases from the Yanshan Mountains to the southern area, and first increases and then decreases from the Bashang Plateau to the southeastern area in the whole BTH area.