Applying ArcHydro and Utility Network Analyst (Trials and Tribulations)

Allen Hoerle
GIS Analyst
Forsyth County Geographic Information Services
Cumming, Georgia 30040

Introduction:

The initial goal of this project was to discover if ArcHydro functionality could be

applied to the countys rivers and streams data. ArcHydro is still being released as a beta

version and previous attempts to apply the extension were not successful. After a great

deal of experimenting, we were able to apply the tools to the countys freshwater

network. It was at this point when it was decided to investigate if the tools could be

applied to a network composed of rivers, streams and the storm water network that was

already being utilized. What we discovered was that ArcHydro was not able to provide

all of the necessary tools for analysis of the two networks as a whole. As a result we

looked to Utility Network Analyst to provide the functionality lacking in ArcHydro.

What we discovered was that neither extension was fully able to satisfy our needs.

However, if the two extensions were applied in concert with the understanding of how

each extension examines and interprets a network, we were able to conduct analysis on

the two networks as a whole.

ArcHydro, Getting Started:

The first step to using ArcHydro is the Terrain Processing functions/tools

(Figure 1). These processes are performed on the digital elevation model (DEM) that is
the basis for the area one wishes to examine. A word of caution, it is necessary to do all

of the processes/functions contained in the Terrain Processing. Each step of the terrain

processing creates attributes and raster features that are necessary to the overall

performance of the extension, failure to perform a given step may result in attributes not

being created which retards or prohibits the functionality as a whole.

Figure 1. Print screen image of the ArcHydro toolbar and the Terrain Processing processes drop down menu.

The finer the resolution of the digital elevation model being used in the terrain

analysis the more complete and detailed future analyses will be when using the ArcHydro

extension. The DEM used in this example has a resolution of five feet.
The first process to be applied was the Fill Sink function. This process is identical to

the Fill Sink tool found in ArcToolbox. Low spots in the DEM are filled to permit

the flow of water from one cell to another in the DEM. This process can take a great deal

of time depending on the size and resolution of the DEM being processed. To avoid

crashing ones computer it is recommended that this process be run at night or on a

computer specifically used for involved computations.

Flow Direction is the next analysis performed on the DEM. This function once

again is identical to the tool of the same name located within ArcToolbox. This

procedure determines, on a cell by cell basis, the direction of flow that water or any other

fluid will assume. Flow Accumulation is then determined for the DEM. This tool, like

its predecessors, is located in ArcToolbox. The entire DEM is examined to determine

where flow is interrupted and accumulation will occur.

Stream Definition is the next step in Terrain Processing. This step is the

point at which the user defines the amount of detail that will be depicted in the network.

The default for stream definition is one percent of flow accumulation. This step also

defines the drainage area in square kilometers. Depending on the needs of future

analyses the one percent default may not be an appropriate value for network generation.

When this projects network was created the county had some needs that had to be

addressed, one being that future state requirements mandate that counties be able to

delineate drainage areas of 100 acres or less. For this reason it was necessary to discover

the percent flow value that corresponded to 100 acres or less. For the countys network, a

sixteenth of a percent was chosen, which corresponds to 0.3375 kilometers or 81.9 acres.
This satisfies both state documentation requirements and provided a network that

exceeded USGS Blue Line stream data in network fibrosity.

The next function in Terrain Processing is Stream Segmentation. This

process assigns a unique identification (GRID ID) to each of the segments. The Grid ID

attribute is a crucial attribute in the internal operation of the ArcHydro tools. It provides

a basis for to/from node generation, which in turn allows the user to trace upstream and

downstream movement of water and other materials.

Catchment Grid Delineation(Figure 2) is the then performed using the Flow

Direction raster output created earlier in the DEM analysis. Every cell in the DEM is

assigned an identification number that assigns each cell to an area of similar flow origin

and destination. The identification number corresponds to the number given each

segment of the stream in the Stream Segmentation procedure.

Figure 2. Raster data set created in the Catchment Grid Delineation procedure.
This identification number, due to its commonality with the segments, permits ArcHydro

to delineate streams based on the catchment or catchments for which they are associated.

This becomes important later in the network generation process when drainage points and

junction points are assigned. The next step is the creation of a polygon feature class from

the catchment raster data (Figure 3). At this stage of Terrain Processing each of the

catchment polygons is assigned a Grid ID, which is the same as its raster counterpart, and

a Hydro ID. Hydro IDs are unique identifiers that each part of the final network will

have. Associations are established between the Hydro IDs of features that permit

ArcHydro to analyze the relationships that exist between the constituent parts of the

network.

Figure 3. Polygon feature class created using the Catchment Polygon Processing function.
 Drainage Line Processing is the function of Terrain Processing that

establishes the geometry of the rivers and streams associated with the network (Figure 4).

During this procedure the Stream Segment raster data is converted into a line feature

class.

Figure 4. Vector data created when Drainage Line Processing function is applied.

The vertices that are created in this step have the Grid ID that links the vertices to the

catchment they occupy. This step also creates and populates the attributes that are

necessary for establishing and analyzing upstream and downstream relationships and the

to and from node attribute fields. Connectivity is based on the overall DEM analysis

ArcHydro performs on the DEM. This connectivity is an important point to consider as

elevation/topography is the basis for networks generated using ArcHydro. Topography

determines the connectivity, catchments, sub catchments and ultimately watersheds.

Nothing created as a result of ArcHydro is arbitrary or man made, it is based on the

elevation data that exists. However, this is not to say that every feature created using

ArcHydro exists for example, when the user defines the value to be used in the Stream

Segmentation portion of the analysis, the value chosen may create vertices that will only

exist in times of extreme precipitation or flooding.

The Adjoining Catchment Processing function produces larger amalgamated

upstream catchments from the polygons in the catchment feature class. This process is

carried out to allow for faster processing in later calculations. This process also takes all

of the catchments that have a common final drainage point and makes a polygon to depict

the entire drainage area.

The next function is the Drainage Point Processing. Every catchment has a

down stream drainage point, the area were water departs from one catchment to another.

This function determines the downstream location and assigns a point feature class.

Finally, the next two processes, Longest Flow Path for Catchments and

Longest Flow Path for Adjoining Catchments did not function well and either crashed

the computer during computation or produced results that did not offer any tangible use

in further analyses. This was attributed to the beta status associated with ArcHydro. The

remaining Terrain Processing functions pertain to slope and have similar functionality

to those tools that exist for slope generation in ArcToolbox.

Rectifying and Applying What Was Created:

Once all of the Terrain Processing tools were applied to the DEM it was then
necessary to rectify the results/products of the before mentioned steps. When ArcHydro

processes a DEM many of the vertices created are not accurately placed. An example of

this would be the location of rivers and streams on a floodplain. Rivers and streams that

occupy floodplains often times overflow their banks and erode new channels. This

meandering can be problematic if the DEM being used is several years old. Seasonal or

occasional flow is another consideration. Depending on the value chosen in the Stream

Segmentation process, many of the vertices derived may only exist when a region is

experiencing unusually wet weather that results in flooding or runoff events. In this

analysis a lake was formed by constructing a dam on a major river thoroughfare. As a

result of the lakes creation the topography was changed and the resultant rivers and

streams data needed modification to make generating a network possible.

The process used in this example employed a recent aerial photo in conjunction

with a low z value hill shade (z value of 1) of the county. By making the aerial photo

transparent, the hill shade was visible. This provided a means of relocating streams in

their appropriate channels (Figure 5). When the correction to the vertices is being

conducted it is vitally important to move the vertices, do not delete vertices and digitize

them anew. The editing method is important because when vertices are deleted, all of

the attribute information associated with the vertices is also deleted. Again, the new

vertices created during digitization lack the necessary attributes for network generation.

This attention to detail will make for slow progress, but will make for fewer headaches

later in the network production and subsequent analyses. During this part of data

rectification when it was elected to redefine the counties water bodies, many of the water

body locations were not in agreement with the aerial photos. Rectifying location was just
simply a matter of redigitizing the water feature to agree with the shape and size depicted

in the aerial photo. The digitizing was performed at a scale of 1 to 1000 or less.

Figure 5. Air photo and hill shade overlay with rivers and streams, the visual aid used in the relocation of incorrect vertices.

The aerial photo chosen as a guide was one taken in the autumn and the lack of foliage

permitted a clearer image of the shore lines associated with each water body.

Another feature our project elected to include was the dams and natural and man

made levees associated with each individual water body (Figure 6). Delineating the

levees was a simple process of studying the hillshade and looking for the down slope side

of the water body in question. In most cases the down hill slope that acted as a levee was

also the direction of flow of the stream associated with the water body in question. The

digital data associated with dams was easier to apply in that it existed due to state and

federal regulations. Combining the levees and the dams was a simple matter of merging

the two feature classes. This process of creating the dams and levees was undertaken

with the idea of adding impedance to flow into the final network, however, as of the time
of writing this report, a method of including impedances has not been implemented to the

network.

Figure 6. An example of a natural levee on the down slope side of a water body, note the regions of higher elevation are lighter
in color. The levee is located in a region of the shore line of this water body that registers the highest elevation value.

The entire county was reviewed two times, relocating stream vertices and

digitizing water bodies and levees when encountered. Due to the time expended in this

review and correction process it was decided that after the second revision was completed

the new river and stream data would be burned into a copy of the counties DEM. This

would serve to preserve the edits, (moving of vertices) that were made to the new river

and stream feature class should an unforeseen problem occur. It also served as an update,

albeit artificial, to the DEM being used in other applications by the countys GIS staff.
 This update is deemed artificial in that when some of the vertices were moved

some interpretation was necessary and location errors may have occurred. Also, in order

to burn the new rivers and streams into the countys DEM, an artificial elevation needs to

be used to mathematically permeate the DEM with the new stream locations. The first

step was the conversion of the rivers and streams into a raster data set using the

conversion tool, Feature to Raster in ArcToolbox. The raster depiction of the rivers

and streams was assigned a value that was significantly lower in elevation to it surrounds

in the DEM to ensure the burning process. The value chosen for recessing the streams

in this project was 20 feet. This would give the rivers and streams a minus 20 foot

difference in elevation from their surrounds. The region surrounding the rivers and

streams were reclassified using the Spatial Analyst extension to give all of the cells in

the county, except for those of the rivers and streams, a value of zero (Figure 7).

Figure 7. Print screen of the reclassification process of the stream raster data set created to burn the newly created streams
into the existing DEM.
 The next step was to burn the streams into the copy of the countys DEM

(Figure 8). This was accomplished using the Raster Calculator in the Spatial Analyst

extension. The reclassified river and streams raster was added to the copy of the counties

DEM and the result was a DEM that had the new river and stream data mathematically

burned into it.

Figure 8. Print screen of the burning in process, the streams raster data set is added to the existing DEM thereby
mathematically modifying the DEM to include the stream locations we wish to include.

Once the rivers and streams were burned into the DEM it was necessary to repeat

the Terrain Processing steps anew. Once this was accomplished, then the process of

checking the streams placement was conducted once again and any vertices that were
out of place were moved. For the most part when the streams where burned into the

existing DEM they maintained their location through the second round of Terrain

Processing. Once the burned streams feature class locations were rectified, it was time

to transfer attribute information from the old river, stream and water body feature classes.

Attribute information was transferred using the functionality of the Spatial Adjustment

toolbar, for the rivers and streams (Figure 9). The old and new rivers and stream feature

class was then added to ArcMap and the attributes of the old feature class were added to

the new feature class using the attribute transfer tool.

Figure 9. Print screen illustrating the Attribute Transfer tool used to populate the attribute table of the newly created river
and stream feature class.
 The water bodies attribute transfer was accomplished in the following manner.

The old water body feature class was converted to a point feature class using the

conversion tool available in ArcToolbox. Once the old water bodies geometry was

changed it was then possible to perform a spatial join of the old point geometry water

bodies feature class with the newly digitized water body data.

Now that all of the newly created data possesses the appropriate attribute

information and had been subjected to a rigorous QA/QC process it was time to build the

network to be used in conjunction with the tools in ArcHydro. There are two methods

available for building the network. The first method is a tool set imbedded within

ArcHydro itself and the other method is to build a Geometric Network within ArcCatalog

(Figure 10). The Geometric Network was the one chosen for this project. The feature

classes included in the counties network were the Terrain Processed rivers and streams,

the newly digitized water bodies, dams and levees, wetlands, groundwater recharge areas,

catchments, adjoining catchments and Lake Lanier. In the process of creating the

network, network junctions were created automatically.

The first tool examined in ArcHydro was Flow Path Tracing.(Figure 11) This

tool provides the user with the ability of discerning the path an object would assume if it

were to enter the network at a given point. The user merely clicks on the line segment

where the object entered and a path is drawn to depict the route the object will take

within the total extent of the network. The path created is a drawing like those made

using the drawing functionality associated with Microsoft drawing products. When the

user finishes viewing the route they merely click on the path drawing and delete the

rendering.
Figure 10. Screen shot of the Geometric Network created within ArcCatalog. This network will then be used in conjunction
with ArcHydro.

Figure 11. Screen shot depicting the results of the Flow Path Tracing functionality of ArcHydro. The arrow indicates the
button on the toolbar that will access this function.
 The next aspect of ArcHydro functionality that this project explored was Point

Delineation (Figure 12). This tool allows the user to examine aspects of the network they

have created, one aspect being the upstream and downstream extent of the network from

a given point and the watershed as a whole from the point chosen. This is to say that the

entire portion of the network that flows to the chosen point is delineated. This tool

creates a watershed point feature class from the point chosen as well as a polygon feature

class of the watershed as a whole (Figure 13). This is useful, in that the polygon feature

class of the point delineated watershed can be used in other applications, geoprocessing

being one example.

Figure 12. Screen shot of the Point Delineation functionality of ArcHydro. Note the point used to delineate the region and the
drainage area (pologon) associated with the point.
Figure 13. Screen shot of the river and stream vertices associated with the drainage polygon generated by the Point
Delineation function.

The functionality of ArcHydro is based in large part on the topography, the

elevation of the site being examined. Gravity dictates flow and elevation dictates where

flow starts and finishes. As a result of these simple physical concepts, ArcHydro is able

to determine the regions of a given local that will flow into other regions in the same

region. Once the regions or catchments have been determined/delineated then the flow

within the regions is ascertained, once again based on elevation. The flow within the

catchments is the basis for the vertices that comprise the river and stream feature class

resulting from the Terrain Processing administered to a DEM and the network

connectivity of the vertices is a function of the topography (Figure 14). Therefore,

landscape features may act as impediments to connectivity. For the networks generated
as a result of the Terrain Processing functions in ArcHydro, nature and physics dictate

the networks generated. This is an important concept to note, not all of the networks and

their subsequent tools are going to analyze a network in the same fashion.

Figure 14. Screen shot of the drainage polygon and the catchments associated with the delineated region. Note that the
catchments are the topographic basis for the entire analysis, these are the smallest unit area from which flow is derived.

Integrating a Storm Water Network with a Freshwater Network:

While applying the functions of ArcHydro to the countys freshwater network,

someone in the office suggested that maybe we could integrate the storm water network

in with the freshwater network and create a comprehensive fresh/storm water network for

the county. After examining both networks together in ArcMap issues become apparent
that would act as limitations to the generation of a comprehensive network. One

limitation was the rivers and streams were created via an analysis of the topography of

the county and the vertices of the rivers and streams are connected as a result of elevation

and how water runs over the land. The storm water network is a contrived network, a

man made network. Through engineering this network moves water from one area to

another. The topography of the area being drained was not necessarily a limiting factor.

If water needed to be moved out of an area the necessary construction was conducted and

water movement accomplished. Connectivity for the storm water network was a function

of engineering, not nature. Therefore, applying the terrain analysis functions in

ArcHydro was not going to produce the desired results. Burning the storm water network

into the DEM was not the solution because depending on the depth value used to burn the

vertices, it may or may not be sufficient to produce the desired flow direction. This

caused concern initially because the Terrain Processing functions produce many of the

attributes necessary for network production and analysis. Another limitation was

connectivity between the two networks. In some instances throughout the county, the

rivers and streams were located long distances from a storm water discharge. This

distance issue made for the adoption of the concept, if storm water could reach a fresh

water source, where would the encounter happen and what would be the logical route.

This concept/rule proved useful in that it made focusing on the topography between the

storm water outlet and the nearest river and stream vertices important. Physical laws and

topography still needed to be adhered to whenever possible to make the network

palatable to the end users within the county. The result was the need of creating vertices
connecting the storm water outlets to the river and stream line segment that were the

closest topologically to the outlet in question (Figure 15).

Figure 15. Print screen depicting the connectivity established between the rivers and streams and the storm water outlets.
The connecting vertices are yellow and the storm water outlets are the red point features. Note the adherence to the
topography when establishing a path for connecting the two line types. In many cases topography produced circuitous paths
between the two line types.

Once the vertices connecting the two water systems were completed it was a simple

matter of merging all of the vertices together into a comprehensive water feature class.

The next obstacle was the creation of the attributes necessary for ArcHydro and

Utility Network Analyst to perform analyses on the comprehensive water feature class.

ArcHydro has a drop down menu of Attribute Tools that allow for the creation of some of

the same attributes created by the Terrain Processing functions. A tool exists for the
creation and population of ArcHydro ID in the Attribute Tools drop down menu (Figure

16).

Figure 16. Print Screen of the Assign Hydro ID that was applied to the comprehensive water feature class to populate the
portions of the attribute table that did not have this attribute, namely the storm water vertices

As discussed earlier in the Terrain Processing portion of this project, the

ArcHydro ID permits an association between the constituent parts of a network within the

context of the functionality of ArcHydro. The Assign ArcHydro ID tool was run for all

of the features to be included in the final comprehensive network, which included the

comprehensive water feature class and all of the features of the storm water network,

headwalls, gravity mains et al. When this procedure was complete the next tool applied

to the comprehensive water feature class was the Generate From/To Nodes For Lines
attribute tool. When this attribute field was populated it was then necessary to run the

Find Next Downstream Line tool (Figure 17).

Figure 17. Print Screen of the Attribute Tools Generate From/To Nodes for Lines and Find Next Downstream Line that
where applied to the comprehensive water feature class.

At this point it was decided that a test would be conducted with the data and a

Geometric Network was created with all of the feature classes from both the freshwater

network and the storm water network. The resulting network was used in conjunction

with the ArcHydro tools previously mentioned. The results were less then satisfactory.

After an examination of attribute tables of line features that performed well in ArcHydro,

it was discovered that the flow direction was not defined for all of the vertices in the

comprehensive water feature class. Normally, the direction of digitization is the assumed
or default direct of flow used by many network tools. However, in the case of ArcHydro

the flow direction needed to be an established attribute. The Network Tools drop down

menu in ArcHydro has two tools that will establish and populate an attribute table. These

tools were run on the comprehensive water feature class to establish the flow direction for

all of the vertices (Figure 18) .

Figure 18 Print screen depiction of the Network Tools Store Flow Direction and Set Flow Direction. Both of these functions
had to be applied to the comprehensive river and stream feature class to set the flow direct and populate the attribute table of
the feature class.

With the flow direction now a part of the attribute table, the comprehensive water

network was once again constructed in ArcCatalog. The comprehensive geometric

network was applied in conjunction with the tools contained in ArcHydro. While doing
this however, the Flow Path Tracing tool did not function as expected. This function

only traced the freshwater portion of the comprehensive network. In order to trace the

flow path it was necessary to use the Utility Network Analyst. One reason for this may

be the missing attributes that are produced as a result of Terrain Processing, Grid ID for

example. The comprehensive network as previously mentioned could not be processed

using this ArcHydro functionality. Regardless, Utility Network Analyst was able to

perform this analysis. Point Delineation worked when used in conjunction with the

comprehensive network. This function as a whole is the most instructive and useful of

the two ArcHydro tools (Figure 19).

Figure 19. Print screen depiction of the Point Delineation tool applied to the comprehensive network. Note that the storm
water features were also included in the delineation.
What Next:

One function available to both ArcHydro and Utility Network Analyst is the ability to

choose a point within the network and derive the upstream and downstream extent of the

network from the given point. The comprehensive water network has issues when this

function is applied in ArcHydro. Connectivity seems to be the culprit for this tools

failure to produce results. As of writing this paper, corrections to connectivity are being

rectified using Utility Network Analyst, however, it is necessary to understand that

upstream and downstream connectivity is derived differently between the two extensions.

ArcHydro uses topography as its basis for the extent of connectivity, whereas Utility

Network Analyst does not have a built in constraint like topography to dictate

connectivity. Therefore, edits made to the network using Utility Network Analyst have

to be made with care to ensure that topographic constraints are being maintained. When

a complete understanding of how both extensions function is derived it is possible to use

the two in concert to achieve the desired results.

During the course of working on this project, some of its applications became

apparent. If a spill of a foreign material were to occur, whether the spill happened near a

storm water inlet or directly to a freshwater feature, tracing the path of the foreign entity

would be possible. Consider the benefits first responders would have in containing the

progress of a foreign entity. It could also serve as a diagnostic tool in determining areas

that may flood more then other areas simply due to presence of storm water features that

act to contain and slow the progress of water.

Figure 20. Print screen depicting the Trace Feature by Next Down ID Attribute. Note that very little of the network was
selected and traced. The connectivity issues responsible are associated with the missing attributes in the storm water that are
derived in Terrain Processing, which can not be performed on the comprehensive water feature class.

Figure 21. Print screen depicting the Trace Upstream functionality of Utility Network Analyst. Note the difference in
connectivity between this example and that of ArcHydro. Connectivity is not determined and analyzed using the same
attributes and topography is not taken into consideration. Also note that all of the features of the comprehensive network are
selected in the trace, including the storm water features. This was lacking in the trace associated with ArcHydro.
 Further improvements would be the ranking and weighting of water bodies,

wetlands and ground water recharge areas. If these features could be incorporated into

the comprehensive network as functioning entities, then perhaps the entire hydrologic

cycle could be modeled. It could also be used to model the suspended solids that

wetlands could remove due to sedimentation from the freshwater column. This kind of

modeling could provide information for conservation and first responders concerning

pollutant contamination of the countys water resources.

Resources Utilized:

Maidment, David. R. 2002. ArcHyro, GIS for Water Resources, ESRI Press, Redlands,
California.

ESRI. 2006. ArcGIS Help, Redlands, California.

Note of Worth:

After you have created your new streams feature class, it will be necessary to
differentiate between blue line cartographic streams and the improved dendridic layer
ArcHydro generated. This is of significant import if you make maps for the general
public. The increased fibrosity can be misleading to individuals who are not aware of
how the new streams layer was created.