Eden Basin - Case Study

Key Facts

The Eden Basin is in north-west England, between the mountains of the Lake District and the Pennines.
The River Eden’s source is in the Pennine hills in south Cumbria.
It flows north-west through Appleby-in-Westmorland and Carlisle.
Its mouth is in the Solway Firth at the Scottish border.
The river basin is in a largely rural area, with many scenic landscapes that are popular with tourists.
There are a wide variety of river landforms.

Variety of Landforms

Waterfalls

Hell Gill Force is a waterfall near the source of the River Eden.
It has formed where there is a change in the rock type from hard limestone to softer sandstone.
The water has eroded the soft rock forming a step down in the river channel.
Below the waterfall there is a steep-sided gorge, left behind as the waterfall has retreated up the valley.

V-shaped Valleys

many streams flow down the steep slopes of the hill side at the edge of the basin from about 600 m above sea level.
Weathering (by freeze-thaw), transportation (traction) and erosion (by abrasion) have carved out steep-sided V-shaped valleys, e.g. in the north-east of the Lake District.

Meanders

As more tributaries join the River Eden, the river gets bigger, which gives it more power to erode the river channel sideways.
In the lower course, the river valley becomes wider and flatter, and meanders form on the valley floor, e.g near Salkeld.
As these meananders have grown, some get cut off to form ox-bow lakes, e.g. where Briggle Beck joins the Eden near Salkeld.

Floodplains

Carlisle is built on the floodplain of the River Eden.
Here the land is low-lying and flatter (less than 100 m above sea level).
As meanders have migrated across the valley floor, the floodplain has become wider.
Sediment has also been deposited when the river has flooded, building up the floodplain.