Urban and non-urban settlements in many regions are usually located on the lands bordering shores, rivers, canals or streams. However, housing complexes, landfills, and areas for agriculture and mining are often assigned to locations without sufficiently detailed hydrographic information about subsequent potential if not actual flow and flooding impacts. Yet, for sustainable community planning with emphasis on harmonizing social, economic, environmental and institutional aspects, such information is essential. This article demonstrates how this need can in part be accommodated by way of digital elevation and wet-area modelling and mapping using the upper component of the Choapa watershed in Chile as a case study. The terrain of this area has sharply incised valleys, with communities, fields and roads strung narrowly along the Choapa River and its tributaries. Above these locations along the Estero de Los Pelambres near the Chile-Argentina border are major mining and mineral refining activities. This article provides modelling and mapping details about the wet-to-moist area zonation along the upper Choapa River valleys, and addresses some of the mining-induced changes from 2000 to 2010.

This article demonstrates how currently available digital elevation (NASA SRTM; 30 m resolution) and hourly global precipitation data (rain, snow; 5 and 10 km resolution) can be used to hydrographically quantify the regional watershed management context across northern Chile. This is done through comprehensive derivations of flow direction, flow accumulation, flow channels, floodplain extent, depressions, and upslope watershed outlines. In turn, these derivations allow for estimating potential precipitation accumulations within any watershed, and turn these into subsequent storm-averaged discharge estimates at, e.g., at any road-flow-channel crossing points. This article elaborates on this by modelling and mapping hydrological conditions and subsequent storm damage at the regional scale and at select locations in terms of recent flood events on March 2015, May 2017, and June 2017. It was found that modelled flood extent and storm-estimated discharge volumes and rates generally conform to reported values including storm-caused damages within communities along the Huasco, Elqui, Limari, Copiapó and Salado rivers. This included the storm response assessment of six water reservoirs as these varied, as quantified, from normal (Puclaro, La Laguna, Cogoti), at capacity (La Paloma, Cogoli), and overflowing (Recoleta). The details of the local to regional assessments are presented in the form hydrologically explicit maps, figures and tables. Together, these attest to the general validity of the framework as introduced. Hydrometrically based stream-discharge calibrations would assist in further refining the approach, especially in terms of estimating local to regional runoff coefficients.