Exploring Urbanization within Accotink Creek

Here is a slide show I put together discussing urbanization and its characteristics, effects, and counter measures being taken by Fairfax County.

Altitudes

Finding the highest point of the headwaters for the watershed was definitely the hardest part for myself (it had been quiet awhile since I attended geology class) but finally was able to locate them.  They are located in the northern section of the watershed in Accotink bear branch (north-east) near Dunn Loring metro and the Accotink- Daniel's run branch (north-west).

Bottom left circled in red (450ft)

Top right circled in red  (450ft)

The drainage point is Accotink Bay to Gunston Cove to the Potomac River.

Accotink Bay - Black Circle, Gunston Cove - Red Circle, Potomac River - Green Circle

  

Tributaries

In an effort to better understand how the water flows Fairfax County has created layers for their watershed viewer which allows to see the tributaries that make up the Accotink Creek.  Below are screen captures that show the whole of Accotink creek and its contributing branches.

North end of the Accotink Creek

Central section of the Accotink Creek

South end and drainage area of the Accotink Creek

Land Where the Water Flows

Attempt at outlining the Accotink Creek Watershed in Google Mymaps

Fairfax's  Viewer Topographic layer

Fairfax's Viewer with imagery layer

The major neighborhoods that fall within the Accotink Creek Watershed are Fairfax City, Town of Vienna, and a grouping of suburban areas; Mantua, North and West Springfield, and Newington.  Also, part of the Army, Fort Belvior, resides in the watershed.

Fairfax's Topographic layer showing hieghts in red and  closer to sea leve turing green

I tried to use googles mymaps to outline the topography of Accotink Creek watershed with reasonable success.  The inability to finely adjust the zoom feature inhibited more precision with outlining.  Some more research and playing around with the app may enlighten.  Fairfax county already has a very well established topography map database called 'Watershed Viewer' which allowed me to explore the different topographical options they had provided.

I plan on visiting one of the tributaries and photo-documenting the experience.  It will hopefully give a bit of life to the big-picture/birds-eye view that maps provide.  

Fairfax County's website provided the above Watershed Viewer screen captures along with information regarding the square footage but I wanted to try and calculate it myself using Microsoft paint, so below is just that.

Using the 2 mile legend I calculated mymap to 48sq2 miles of watershed area, where Fairfax has is designated at 51sq2 miles.  I was impressed with how close this rough calculation was to the one Fairfax has.