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A reach is a segment of a stream, river, or arm of the sea, usually suggesting a straight, level, uninterrupted stretch. They are traditionally defined by the capabilities of sailing boats, as a stretch of a watercourse which, because it is straightish, can be sailed in one
reach Reach or REACH may refer to: Companies and organizations * Reach plc, formerly Trinity Mirror, large British newspaper, magazine, and digital publisher * Reach Canada, an NGO in Canada * Reach Limited, an Asia Pacific cable network company ...
(that is, without tacking). Reaches are often named by those using the river, and a reach may be named for landmarks, natural features, and historical reasons (see, for instance, Gallions' Reach, named after the family that once owned its banks). A reach may be an expanse, or widening, of a stream or river channel. This commonly occurs after the river or stream is dammed. A reach is similar to an arm, though an arm may bend and thus have multiple reaches. The term "reach" can also refer to a level stretch, as between river rapids or locks in a
canal Canals or artificial waterways are waterways or engineered channels built for drainage management (e.g. flood control and irrigation) or for conveyancing water transport vehicles (e.g. water taxi). They carry free, calm surface f ...
. The word may also be used more generally to refer to any extended portion or stretch of land or water, or even metaphorically. In
fluvial In geography and geology, fluvial processes are associated with rivers and streams and the deposits and landforms created by them. When the stream or rivers are associated with glaciers, ice sheets, or ice caps, the term glaciofluvial or fluviog ...
hydrology Hydrology () is the scientific study of the movement, distribution, and management of water on Earth and other planets, including the water cycle, water resources, and environmental watershed sustainability. A practitioner of hydrology is call ...
, a reach is a convenient subdivision of study; it may be any length of river of fairly uniform characteristics, or the length between gauging stations, or simply the length of a watercourse between any two defined points. These may be measured in terms of
river mile A river mile is a measure of distance in miles along a river from its mouth. River mile numbers begin at zero and increase further upstream. The corresponding metric unit using kilometers is the river kilometer. They are analogous to vehicle ro ...
s. As of 2015, the US Board on Geographic Names records 334 place names in the US with the characterization of a named "reach".USGS Survey GNIS Database
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Gallery

Image:Hanford Reach.jpg, Example: Hanford Reach National Monument, Washington State, US. The last significant free-running (undammed) section of the Columbia River in the US File:River Thames Reaches.jpg, A map of the reaches of the River Thames; it can be seen that a reach is a straightish stretch (and can therefore be sailed in one
reach Reach or REACH may refer to: Companies and organizations * Reach plc, formerly Trinity Mirror, large British newspaper, magazine, and digital publisher * Reach Canada, an NGO in Canada * Reach Limited, an Asia Pacific cable network company ...
, one straight-line path between
tacks TACK is a group of archaea acronym for Thaumarchaeota (now Nitrososphaerota), Aigarchaeota, Crenarchaeota (now Thermoproteota), and Korarchaeota, the first groups discovered. They are found in different environments ranging from acidophilic the ...
, unless the wind is too close to head-on to allow the sailing-boat to
reach Reach or REACH may refer to: Companies and organizations * Reach plc, formerly Trinity Mirror, large British newspaper, magazine, and digital publisher * Reach Canada, an NGO in Canada * Reach Limited, an Asia Pacific cable network company ...
) File:Barge Match (Thames River) RMG PY4069.tiff, Thames barges reaching on the Thames during a race; they are probably on Gravesend Reach


See also

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Meander A meander is one of a series of regular sinuous curves in the channel of a river or other watercourse. It is produced as a watercourse erodes the sediments of an outer, concave bank ( cut bank) and deposits sediments on an inner, convex ban ...
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Rapid Rapids are sections of a river where the river bed has a relatively steep gradient, causing an increase in water velocity and turbulence. Rapids are hydrological features between a ''run'' (a smoothly flowing part of a stream) and a ''cascade'' ...
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Stream pool A stream pool, in hydrology, is a stretch of a river or stream in which the water depth is above average and the water velocity is below average. Formation A stream pool may be bedded with sediment or armoured with gravel, and in some cases t ...


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Reach (Geography) Physical geography Fluvial landforms Rivers Water streams Hydrology