Review of The Dutch Rhine, a Restrained River by Wilfried Ten BrinkeThe Dutch Rhine, a Restrained RiverVeen Magazines B.V.90 76988 91 9, NUR 933$50.00

Abstract

The Rhine River in The Netherlands is not a single watercourse but rather a system of river branches fanning out over the country. These fluvial processes are reminders of a more dynamic past and are still recognizable in today’s land surface. After the dikes were constructed, the river and the sea were excluded from the countryside and the rivers were largely restrained. This book centers on dynamic fluvial processes between the dikes, with reference to the lowlands in the period before channel restraint. Wilfried Ten Brinke works for the Dutch Directorate-General for Public Works and Water Management Rijkswaterstaat in Arnhem. He brings a unique perspective on rivers in which old river courses partly determine the processes in modern-day rivers. His primary contribution is to link geology and river science with applications to the Rhine River Branches in the Netherlands. The content is subdivided into twelve chapters, namely; 1 “A Straightjacket of Dikes and Groynes;” 2 “Discharge of Rainwater and Meltwater;” 3 “A Sand and Gravel Bed;” 4 “The Rhine River Courses in the Low Countries;” 5 “Turbid Waters and Shifting Riverbeds;” 6 “Riverbed Erosion: Trends and Causes;” 7 “Floods: The Force of the Water and the Reaction of the River;” 8 “River Bank Beaches: Thanks to the Groynes;” 9 “Levee Formation and Sand Drifts;” 10 “River Bifurcations;” 11 “Flows of Gravel, Sand and Silt: From Germany to the North Sea;” and 12 “Managing and Controlling Restrained Rivers.” The book contains a short bibliography, acknowledgments, and a relatively detailed and useful index. This manuscript was first brought to my attention as a translation from the original Dutch version. The text was easy to read, well-written and interesting; however, it seemed to lack any apparent logical sequence. In hindsight, it is obvious that the main theme of this book is a contrasting view of the Rhine River branches. It contains a well-illustrated perspective on the fascinat-