Determination of the drainage basin characteristics using vector GIS

Detailed geomorphologic characteristics need to be compiled for performing hydrologic modeling of a basin. Basin form and hydrologic characteristics are to be related so the basin form must also be represented by quantitative descriptors. The typical morphologic characteristics used in hydrological analyses are basin area, perimeter, mainstream length, total stream length, contour length, basin shape (form factor, circularity ratio, compactness ratio, basin elongation), slope, drainage density, relief (maximum relief, relief ratio, relative relief), effective basin width, and median elevation. The objective of this study is to propose an algorithm to automatically calculate basin characteristics using vector GIS. The results produced by the algorithm were compared to the manual method and the two methods were found statistically similar.