Ecological Engineering 136 (2019) 30–37

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Ecological Engineering
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ecoleng

Assessing the context and ecological effects of river restoration – A meta- T

analysis
⁎
Weiwei Lua,b, Raquel Arias Fontb,c, Shuiping Chenga, , Jieqiong Wangd, Johannes Kollmannb
a
College of Environmental Science and Engineering, Key Laboratory of Yangtze River Water Environment, Ministry of Education, Tongji University, 1239 Siping Road,
Shanghai 200092, China
b
Chair of Restoration Ecology, Technical University of Munich, Emil-Ramann-Straße 6, 85354 Freising, Germany
c
School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, B15 2TT Birmingham, UK
d
College of Architecture and Urban Planning, Tongji University, 1239 Siping Road, Shanghai 200092, China

A R T I C LE I N FO A B S T R A C T

Keywords: A large number of qualitative and semi-quantitative analyses have been performed to summarize the effects of
Biodiversity river restoration, while systematic and quantitative assessments of the literature on river restoration are still
Degradation type rare. To fill this gap, we conducted a meta-analysis of 55 peer-reviewed publications describing assessments of
Ecosystem services river restoration with indicators of biodiversity or ecosystem services (ES). The core of the study was to identify:
Organism group
(i) the overall ecological effects of river restoration; (ii) the restoration effects on different organism groups and
Restoration age
types of ES, including the relationship between biodiversity and ES; and (iii) the influence of the restoration
Restoration techniques
context, that is degradation types, restoration techniques and restoration age. The meta-analysis revealed that
river restoration significantly enhanced ecological conditions. However, restoration effects varied among or-
ganism groups and ES, with plant abundance and regulating services showing higher responses to restoration.
Moreover, a trend of a positive correlation was found between biodiversity and ES. Restoration activities showed
most significant effects in the context of hydromorphological degradation or land-use changes, and channel
reconfiguration and riparian buffer establishment had a particularly favourable outcomes. Only regulating
services showed a positive correlation with restoration age; thus, long-time monitoring is necessary to fully
understand restoration effects. Overall, our meta-analysis provides evidence-based advice for future projects and
assessment of river restoration.

1. Introduction et al., 2015).

Rivers and floodplains are among the ecosystems that have suffered
most from human interventions including channelization, pollution and
destruction of riparian vegetation (Antón et al., 2011; Pedersen et al.,
2007). Many rivers have changed from dynamic and diverse ecosystems
to static and homogeneous ones, resulting in enormous losses of bio-
diversity and ecological functions (Allan and Castillo, 2007; Tockner
et al., 2009). More recently, river restoration projects have been im-
plemented at an increasing rate in many regions for recreating habitats,
and for improving biodiversity and ecosystem services (ES) (Bernhardt
et al., 2005; Nilsson et al., 2016). However, in contrast to the rapid
growth in demand and practice of river restoration, little is known
about the actual effects of restoration and the influence of the re-
storation context, i.e. the degradation type, the restoration age and the
specific techniques applied. This is due to a lack of adequate monitoring
and assessment (Bernhardt et al., 2005; Jähnig et al., 2011; Hering
Evaluation of restoration effects is essential for any scientific and
practical progress in river restoration (Kondolf, 1995; Palmer et al.,
2005). The studies that monitored and evaluated the effects of river
restoration mainly focused on changes in biodiversity, primarily on
invertebrates, fish and macrophytes (Antón et al., 2011; Li et al., 2014;
Reeves et al., 2016; Tullos et al., 2009), while few paid attention to
changes of in ES (McMillan et al., 2014; Pander et al., 2015). Combined
studies evaluating changes in biodiversity and ES are even more scarce
(Dolph et al., 2015; Wu et al., 2013) and, to our knowledge, no study
exists in the peer-reviewed literature on the relationship between bio-
diversity and ES during river restoration. Furthermore, contrasting
evidence has been published on restoration effects on biodiversity of
river ecosystems. For example, some studies showed that restoration
improved the conditions of certain groups of organisms (Besacier-
Monbertrand et al., 2014; de Jong and Cowx, 2016), while others found
almost no biotic effects of river restoration, for example on benthic

⁎
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: shpcheng@tongji.edu.cn (S. Cheng).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecoleng.2019.06.004
Received 20 September 2018; Received in revised form 28 May 2019; Accepted 9 June 2019
Available online 15 June 2019
0925-8574/ © 2019 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
W. Lu, et al.
invertebrates (Friberg et al., 2014; Haase et al., 2013; Lepori et al.,
2005), macrophytes (Lorenz et al., 2012; Pedersen et al., 2007) or fish
(Antón et al., 2011; Lorenz et al., 2013; Schmutz et al., 2014). De-
gradation types, restoration techniques (de Jong and Cowx, 2016) and
restoration age (Hering et al., 2015; Paillex et al., 2017) most likely
impact the effects of river restoration, but have rarely been studied.
Thus, a comprehensive assessment is needed of the restoration outcome
(“ecological effects”) on both biodiversity and ES, based on all scientific
studies available.
Existing reviews of the effects of river restoration are mostly based
on qualitative (Hering et al., 2013; Pander and Geist, 2013; Olden et al.,
2014; Rubin et al., 2017) or semi-quantitative analyses (Palmer et al.,
2014), but cannot infer general conclusions from inconsistent results of
multiple studies. A meta-analysis performed as an integrative and
quantitative approach, with more reliable results, would overcome this
challenge (Chung et al., 2006).
Some meta-analyses of restoration effects on ecosystem conditions
(Rey Benayas et al., 2009), or on fish, macroinvertebrates and macro-
phytes (Miller et al., 2010; Whiteway et al., 2010; Kail et al., 2015)
have already been carried out. However, despite the previous con-
tributions made by practitioners and scientists, practical knowledge is
lacking on restoration effectiveness based on degradation type and re-
storation technique, and on the influence of the period since restora-
tion. Our meta-analysis aims to fill this knowledge gap.
We quantified the ecological effects of river restoration based on the
results of studies published in the peer-reviewed literature in recent
thirty decades. Changes in biodiversity are measured with the in-
dicators of abundance, density and species numbers of five organism
groups: fish, invertebrates, periphyton, macrophytes and riparian vas-
cular plants. ES indicators were classified according to the Millennium
Ecosystem Assessment (MEA), with a focus on regulating and sup-
porting services (MEA, 2005). Regulating services were considered as
those functions providing societal benefits by the modification or sta-
bilization of ecological processes. This could be the regulation of cya-
nobacterial growth by water purification capacity of riparian zones or
stabilization of local climate by the microclimate regulation of rivers.
As for supporting services, we classified the publications as maintaining
the certain compartments of the ecosystems functioning, i.e. nutrient
cycling or primary productivity linked to basal food sources and oxygen
concentrations.
The meta-analysis had three objectives, (1) to identify the overall
ecological effect of river restoration, i.e. to test whether or not re-
storation has a positive effect on ecosystem conditions; (2) to in-
vestigate the effects of river restoration on different biodiversity com-
ponents and ES, including potential correlations between biodiversity
and ES; and (3) to disentangle the influences of the restoration context.
2. Materials and methods
2.1. Literature search
We made a systematic search of the peer-reviewed literature to
identify quantitative evidence of the ecological effects of river re-
storation. In the ISI Web of Knowledge database, all relevant studies
were identified on 27 April 2017, using the following keywords:
(stream* OR river*) AND (restor* OR rehabilit* OR revitali*) AND
(service* OR function* OR biodiversity*). The initial search was refined
to the subject areas “Environmental Sciences”, “Ecology”, “Water
Resources”, “Biodiversity Conservation”, “Engineering Environment”,
“Fisheries”, “Rehabilitation”, “Environmental Studies”, “Plant
Sciences”, “Multidisciplinary Sciences”, “Biology” and “Zoology”, using
the “Refine Results” option in Web of Knowledge. Based on this search
string, 3131 references were retrieved. However, despite the initially
filtered papers might contain the search keywords and belong to the
subject areas, the actual content may miss the aim of our analysis. Thus,
we scrutinised the title and abstract of each of these publications, which
31
Ecological Engineering 136 (2019) 30–37
resulted in a list of 460 references to be included in the meta-analysis.
For this subsample, five criteria were used to decide whether or not
the study could be included: (1) the research systems should be a river
or stream ecosystem (excluding wetland, floodplain and marine eco-
system); (2) changes in variables relating to biodiversity or/and ES
should be reported in a quantitative way; (3) information should be
presented that compared the restored and unrestored conditions or
control conditions; (4) the work should be a field study; and (5) the
restoration should have taken place at least 1 year earlier. Finally,
combined with eight papers traced from two other review papers (i.e.
Pan et al., 2016; Rubin et al., 2017) and two papers (i.e. Vehanen et al.,
2010; Louhi et al., 2016) from other papers’ reference lists, 55 studies
formed the basis of the meta-analysis (see Supplementary Materials).
2.2. Data extraction
Data of mean value, standard deviation and sample size of different
measured metrics in restored and unrestored areas, and additional in-
formation (i.e. river name, degradation types, restoration age, restora-
tion techniques) were extracted from the text, the figures and/or tables
in the papers selected. Data were extracted from figures using
PlotDigitizer (http://plotdigitizer.sourceforge.net/). Biodiversity data
were differentiated according to abundance, density and species
number of different organism groups: fish, invertebrates, periphyton,
macrophytes and riparian vascular plants. Only a few studies explicitly
referred to the concept of ES. However, based on the definition of dif-
ferent ES classified by the MEA (2005), and the concrete metrics
measured in each study, we adopted the identification and classification
of reported variables as measures of ES (Table A1). For example, as
indicator for regulating services Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD) was
classified as a contribution to ecosystem regulation. Biodiversity data
were differentiated in abundance, density and species number of dif-
ferent organism groups, i.e. fish, invertebrate, periphyton, macrophyte
and riparian vascular plant. Other information including river name,
project region, river length, restoration age, cause of degradation
(channelization, damming, deforestation, fishing and land-use) and
restoration measures (boulder addition, gravel introduction, wood ad-
dition, channel reconfiguration and riparian buffer establishment) were
also collected. Studies without well-defined organism group or or-
ganism group with too small sample size (i.e. phytoplankton), active
restoration measures or measures without well-defined clear definitions
were classified as “others”.
2.3. Quantifying ecological effect and publication bias
Effect size that reveals the amount of the treatment effect or the
strength of the interaction within two variables (Borenstein et al., 2009)
is an important currency in meta-analyses, and can be used to quantify
the ecological effect of river restoration. The effect size of response ratio
R (Hedges et al., 1999) can be calculated without replications, which
are most commonly used to express the effect magnitude of an ex-
perimental treatment. Variables that are expected to have lower values
after restoration (e.g., nutrient concentrations) were reciprocally
transformed to ensure that all results representing a good ecological
state pointed in the same (positive) direction.
The response ratio R (representing the ln response ratio) and its
variance were computed as:
− −
R = ln[(Xa + 1)/(Xb + 1)] (1)
− −
where Xa and Xb were the means of the values under restored and
unrestored conditions. The response ratio is dimensionless with va-
lues > 0 indicating river improvement and < 0 denoting river de-
gradation. To avoid the occurrence of 0 in the natural logarithm of the
equation, “1” was added to both the numerator and denominator of the
equation (Moreno-Mateos et al., 2012), which demonstrated has little
W. Lu, et al.
effect on conclusions (Scheiner and Gurevitch, 2001). Calculations were
done in R project version 3.4.3 using the metafor (Viechtbauer, 2010)
and compute.es packages (Del Re, 2013), while the actual classification
of the response ratio for detailed analysis can be seen in Appendix A.
Supplementary material.
To assess the potential publication bias, a funnel plot (Fig. A1) and
Egger’s regression test were performed (Egger et al., 1997). Further
information assessing publication bias can be found in the supple-
mentary material.
2.4. Statistical analyses
The meta-analysis implies certain dependencies that need to be
addressed: location dependence (i.e. studies performed in the same
river), within-research-group dependence (studies performed by the
same research group or authors) and study dependence (different
measurements extracted from the same study) (Gurevitch and Hedges,
1999). Dependency was assessed using a three-level meta-analysis
(Cheung, 2014). A mixed effect model followed as:
yij = β1 x ij + u (2) ij + u (3) j + eij
where yij represents the ith effect size in the jth cluster, β1 is the vector
with the regression coefficients including the intercept, x ij is a vector
with the predictors, u (2) ij and u (3) j are the heterogeneity at levels 2 and
3, respectively, andeij is the known sampling variance in the ith effect
size in the jth cluster. For testing the effect of discrete predictors (i.e.
organism group, functions), the intercept was constrained to 0. Statis-
tical analyses were developed in R project version 3.4.3 (https://www.
r-project.org/) using the metaSEM package (Cheung, 2015). To obtain
correlation coefficients between restoration effect and time, Spearman
rank tests were calculated in R project version 3.4.3 (https://www.r-
project.org/).
3. Results
3.1. Overall ecological effect analysis
The 55 studies yielded 435 results on river restoration effect from 19
countries, with Germany, the USA and Switzerland accounting for the
largest percentages (23%, 17% and 8%, respectively). The data point
distribution in the different categories of organism and ecosystem ser-
vices and the concrete metrics are shown in Table A2 in Supplementary
Materials. Considering all studies together, the estimated overall re-
sponse ratio and its 95% confidence intervals were +0.31 and [0.19,
0.42], respectively, situated on the right of the no-effect zero line
(Fig. 1). This means that the overall ecological effect of river restoration
was positive (p < 0.01), despite the response ratios varying sig-
nificantly among the studies, and one-fourth showing no increase
(R ≤ 0) after restoration. This positive effect was also seen in biodi-
versity and ES as a whole, with the estimated response ratio of biodi-
versity being higher than that of ES, suggesting that it is more difficult
to recover ES than biodiversity.
The five groups of organisms revealed different effects of river re-
storation: periphyton showed no significant response to river restora-
tion, while fish, invertebrates, macrophytes and riparian vascular plant
groups responded positively to restoration. We identified a significant
difference in restoration effect between macrophytes and invertebrates,
with the estimated response ratio of macrophytes (0.49) being higher
than that of invertebrates (0.20). Similarly, we found that river re-
storation had a positive effect on regulating services but not on sup-
porting services.
3.2. Magnitude of effect of river restoration on biodiversity and ES
The three biodiversity components (abundance, density and species
Ecological Engineering 136 (2019) 30–37
number) responded to river restoration in different ways, and the or-
ganism groups also showed different magnitudes in their responses to
restoration (Fig. 2).
Overall, river restoration had a favourable effect on biodiversity
(Fig. 2), and the effects of river restoration on abundance, species
number and density were all positive (p < 0.05), with the estimated
response ratio and 95% confidence intervals being 0.50 [0.35, 0.65],
0.18 [0.04, 0.32] and 0.20 [0.01, 0.39], respectively. The estimated
response ratio of abundance differed from that of species number and
density, and was higher for abundance compared to species number
(p < 0.001) and density (p < 0.001). This suggested that river re-
storation had greater effects on species abundance than on species
numbers and densities.
River restoration caused a significant increase in abundance and
species numbers of fish, invertebrates and macrophytes. Periphyton and
riparian vascular plants also showed positive effects for abundance and
density. In other organism groups there were few or no effects of river
restoration, for example in the density metric of invertebrates.
Significant differences in restoration effects between organism groups
existed in abundance and species number components (p < 0.05). The
(2) estimated response ratio of abundance of invertebrates (0.25) was sig-
nificantly lower compared to that of macrophytes (0.66) and periph-
yton (1.11). Similarly, there was a weaker response ratio of species
number for invertebrates (0.17) compared to macrophytes (0.42) and
fish (0.43).
Even with a positive effect on the overall ES, river restoration af-
fected the general ES and particular ES in different ways (Table 1). The
estimated response ratio to regulating services was positive and its 95%
confidence intervals did not include 0, indicating that river restoration
can improve the regulating services. However, there was no significant
effect on supporting services. Hence, it suggested that river restoration
improved the regulating services more strongly than that supporting
ones. Similarly, only habitat structure regulation (p = 0.002) showed
significant effects of river restoration. Thus, although river restoration
had a different effect on ecosystem functions or services, the overall ES
were improved by restoration.
The meta-analysis also tested whether or not the changes in ES were
positively related to the change in biodiversity due to river restoration.
With 31 pairs of studies containing both biodiversity and ES variables, a
complicated relationship between biodiversity components and ES
emerged (Fig. A2), and the mean RR of biodiversity showed a positive
trend with that of ES, but not a linear correlation (p > 0.05, r = 0.24).
3.3. Effect of river restoration context
The meta-analysis explored five types of river degradation causes,
and it showed that restoration activities have most significant effects in
hydromorphological degradation context (p = 0.02; Table 2). More-
over, restoration activities could also show positive effects in the con-
text of degradation due to land-use changes (p = 0.05), like intensified
agriculture or road construction, while not for the contexts of channe-
lization, damming, deforestation and fishing.
The estimated response ratios and its 95% confidence intervals of
restoration techniques of channel reconfiguration and riparian buffer
establishment were all positive. They did not include the zero line for
the overall effects, the ones of biodiversity and ES, indicating that these
two restoration techniques affected restoration most strongly (Table 3).
In addition, ES was also positively affected by the restoration technique
of wood addition, with significant improvements.
Biodiversity components and general ES types responded differently
to restoration age (Fig. 3). No correlation was found between restora-
tion age and the biodiversity components, suggesting that changes in
biodiversity were unrelated to restoration age. Regulating services
(p = 0.02) had a positive relationship with restoration age, while this
was not the case for supporting services (p = 0.89), nor for fish
(p = 0.47), invertebrates (p = 0.99), macrophytes (p = 0.93),
32
W. Lu, et al. Ecological Engineering 136 (2019) 30–37

Fig. 1. Response ratios of biodiversity, ecosystem services (ES) and overall ecological effect of river restoration. In the forest plot the zero line indicates no effect,
with positive effect falling to the right of the zero line.

Fig. 2. Response ratios of four biodiversity components among different organism groups to river restoration.

periphyton (p = NA), phytoplankton (p = NA) and riparian vascular 4. Discussion

plants (p = 0.19). Overall, the results suggest that the restoration effect
had no apparent relation with restoration age. 4.1. Complex effects of river restoration on biodiversity and ES

Overall, there was a positive outcome of river restoration for bio-

diversity and ES. The strongest effects were found in biodiversity stu-
dies that considered species numbers, their abundance and densities.
The increase in abundance was double that of species numbers and

33
W. Lu, et al. Ecological Engineering 136 (2019) 30–37

Table 1 2005; Rosi-Marshall et al., 2006; Li et al., 2014). It also suggests that
Results of the mixed effect multivariate model with ecosystem services (ES) as a one should be cautious when choosing invertebrates for evaluating
covariance used to estimate the response ratio (RR) of ES including the lower restoration due to marginal or contrasting results in different studies
and upper lower confidence intervals (CIlower and CIupper, respectively). (Pedersen et al., 2007; Sarriquet et al., 2007). Moreover, invertebrate
Ecosystem services RR CIlower CIupper p indices may report well on near-natural conditions, while they do not
reflect minor improvements of degraded states (Hahn, 1982; Valentina
Total Ecosystem services 0.219 0.045 0.394 0.013
et al., 2011), especially when using EPT indexes based on Ephemer-
General ES Regulating 0.391 0.037 0.744 0.030
Supporting 0.261 −0.124 0.645 ns
iptera, Plecoptera and Trichoptera. This approach might produce results
Particular ES Connectivity regulation 0.165 −0.299 0.629 ns unrelated to the restored reach, but rather reflect patterns within tri-
Water flow regulation 0.089 −0.348 0.526 ns butaries or the entire catchment (Brosse et al., 2003; Feld and Hering,
Habitat structure regulation 0.642 0.241 1.043 0.002 2007; Giling et al., 2016). Despite invertebrates being directly affected
Water quality 0.118 −0.355 0.591 ns
by the degree of changes in aquatic substrate and the establishment of
Nutrient cycling 0.203 −0.248 0.655 ns
Food/raw materials 0.527 −0.022 1.076 (*) new microhabitats (Hering et al., 2015), the few correlations found
Primary productivity −0.165 −0.841 0.512 ns between habitat heterogeneity and macroinvertebrates further support
this argument (Palmer et al., 2010).
(*) p < 0.10; ns, p ≥ 0.1. The recreation of microhabitats is highly affected by macrophytes,
which also play a significant role in stabilizing river morphology (Jones
Table 2 et al., 1994; Sand-Jensen, 1997). Most effects on macrophytes were
Results of the mixed effect multivariate model with degradation type as a probably related to restoration techniques, for example channel re-
covariance used to estimate the response of ecological effect to different kinds
configuration and river widening. Such techniques can reduce flow
of degradation (response ratio, RR) with the lower and upper lower confidence
velocity and create suitable habitats for pioneer plants (Saldi-Caromile
intervals (CIlower and CIupper, respectively).
et al., 2004; Erwin et al., 2017), which favours other macrophytes and
Degradation types RR CIlower CIupper p riparian vascular plants at later stages of succession. In addition,
Channelization 0.09 −0.08 0.26 ns
macrophytes and helophytes have positive effects on nutrient retention
Damming −0.27 −0.74 0.20 ns and cycling (Ribot et al., 2017).
Deforestation 0.23 −0.34 0.81 ns According to the MEA, nutrient retention and recycling are directly
Hydro-morphological degradation 0.06 0.01 0.11 0.014 related to the supporting services. Thus, the positive restoration effect
Land-use change 0.35 −0.01 0.71 (*)
on macrophytes should improve nutrient dynamics and the resulting
(*) p < 0.10; ns, p ≥ 0.1. ES. However, our meta-analysis produced contrasting results, which
underline the complex relationship between biodiversity and ES.
densities, which suggests that restoration more efficiently increases the Restoration techniques like channel reconfiguration, which can reduce
number of individuals of existing species than it promotes the arrival of flow velocity, might actually decrease the nutrient cycling rate
new biodiversity (Miller et al., 2010; Stoll et al., 2014). (Hasselquist et al., 2015), thus explaining this contrasting result. Fur-
Differences in dispersal potential might partially explain variation thermore, greater input of nutrients will result from connected chan-
among organism groups, with river restoration causing a significant nels, at least under high discharge (Inglett et al., 2008). However,
increase in abundance and species richness of fish, invertebrates and channel reconfiguration may have positive effects on other ecological
macrophytes, but not in the other groups investigated. This is corre- functions related to river-bed dynamics and habitat regulation
sponding with the results showing that river restoration only benefits (Bukaveckas, 2007; Ock et al., 2015).
some groups, i.e. fish, invertebrates and macrophytes (Besacier- Regulating services, which are related to river-bed configuration
Monbertrand et al., 2014; Neale and Moffett, 2016; Reeves et al., 2016). and habitat structure establishment, might benefit significantly from
In addition, the biodiversity response varied greatly among and within channel reconfiguration and wood introduction, as these can create
catchments, mostly due to human intervention. For example, dams habitats and improve habitat heterogeneity (Acuña et al., 2013; Testa
jeopardize species capacity to reach restored river sections (Downs et al., 2011). Moreover, with microhabitat creation and improved ha-
et al., 2011). Hence, dispersal limitation such as habitat fragmentation bitat heterogeneity, macrophytes show positive restoration effects
and lack of a regional species pool might prevent new species from (Januschke et al., 2009; Lorenz et al., 2012). As Pander et al. (2015)
establishing (Brederveld et al., 2011; Sundermann et al., 2011). The demonstrated, improvement in habitat quality for aquatic species mo-
presence of diffuse (e.g. agricultural land use) or point pollution tivates river restoration and often has positive effects on the ecosystem,
(wastewater treatment plants) within the river catchment greatly which can also be used to explain the significant restoration effect on
modified species establishment (Ribot et al., 2017; Lorenz et al., 2013). regulating services.
Species sensitivity to pollution or eutrophication might explain the
limited response of invertebrates to river restoration (Lepori et al.,

Table 3
Results of the mixed effect multivariate model with restoration technique as a covariance used to estimate the response of biodiversity and ecosystem services to
different restoration techniques (response ratio, RR) including the lower and upper lower confidence intervals (CIlower and CIupper, respectively).
Restoration techniques Overall Biodiversity Ecosystem services

RR CIlower CIupper p RR CIlower CIupper p RR CIlower CIupper p

Boulder addition 0.06 −0.15 0.28 ns 0.08 −0.15 0.32 ns −0.19 −0.74 0.36 ns
Channel reconfiguration 0.35 0.22 0.50 6.818e–07 0.36 0.21 0.52 6.985e–06 0.40 0.01 0.80 0.045
Gravel introduction 0.18 −0.08 0.44 ns 0.24 −0.05 0.52 ns −0.16 −0.79 0.48 ns
Riparian buffer 0.74 0.37 1.12 1.153e–04 0.55 0.08 1.03 0.022 0.89 0.20 1.57 0.011
Wood addition 0.26 −0.15 0.68 ns 0.04 −0.41 0.50 ns 1.15 0.30 2.01 0.008
Others 0.04 −0.28 0.36 ns 0.11 −0.23 0.44 – – – –

ns, p ≥ 0.1.

34
W. Lu, et al.
Fig. 3. Correlation between river restoration age and the response ratio for biodiversity components and ecosystem services (ES).
4.2. Restoration context controlling restoration effects
We found that river hydromorphological degradation (e.g. adverse
hydromorphology and drought) and land-use change (intensified agri-
culture or road construction) were the degradation types that seemed to
be most effectively mitigated by restoration. While channelization and
damming have been intensely studied when prioritizing restoration
areas (Kupilas et al., 2017; Renöfält et al., 2013; McManamay et al.,
2013), the cost–benefit ratio of the respective restoration techniques is
not sufficiently understood. In addition, other studies suggest that the
widely used addition of wood, boulder or gravel (Mueller et al., 2014;
Pander et al., 2015) might not be so effective in river restoration. In-
stead, more expensive and complex techniques such channel re-
configuration and riparian buffer establishment could bring greater
success. Thus, the pivotal role of river hydromorphology on river eco-
logical state, which has been highlighted in recent European inventories
(Hering et al., 2015), should be taken into consideration when prior-
itizing restoration efforts.
Overall, the results suggest that effects of restoration age are hidden
by other factors, and only regulating services present a significant po-
sitive relation with it. In several river restoration projects an “unhelpful
resilience” of the degraded system was found, when structural im-
provements, for example restored sand bars or recreated backwaters,
disappeared after a few years (Bauer et al., 2018), or negative factors
persisted despite the structural improvement. Moreover, the different
organism groups revealed no apparent correlation with restoration age.
The variation in the response of different organism groups concurred
with the contradictory results in the peer-reviewed literature.
While the opening of new habitats due to restoration techniques is
expected to favour riparian vascular plants and macrophytes in the
aquatic zones at the first stage of restoration, no clear relationship was
found between restoration age and macrophytes (Lorenz et al., 2012).
Expectations that consumers such as invertebrates and fish will benefit
from the new availability of substrate and microhabitats (Matthaei
et al., 1999; Muotka et al., 2002) have been rarely supported. Haase
et al. (2013) detected only a slight positive effect on fish, or even a
decrease in fish species number despite increasing abundance with re-
storation age (Schmutz et al., 2014).
Species-specific trajectories also contributed to the unclear re-
lationship between restoration age and species recovery. As demon-
strated by Moreno-Mateos et al. (2012), macroinvertebrates required
5–10 years to recover, while it took on average 30 years for plant as-
semblages to develop towards the reference state. For example, the
recovery of aquatic plants can take up to several decades for full de-
velopment, which affects macroinvertebrates due to habitat
35
Ecological Engineering 136 (2019) 30–37
provisioning. This could also explain the restoration debts reported by
many invertebrate studies (Sand-Jensen et al., 1999; Muotka et al.,
2002).
Another controversial aspect is that the disturbance caused by the
restoration techniques, which might produce negative outcomes on
ecosystem biodiversity or ES (Hasselquist et al., 2015). The small
sample size in the advanced age classes within our meta-analysis might
have prevented us to detect long-term effects of restoration. Further-
more, the influence of climate change and extreme events like floods
and drought periods might have compromised the observed trajectories
in river restoration (Bond and Lake, 2005).
4.3. Summary and practical recommendations
The results of our meta-analysis suggest that river restoration sig-
nificantly enhances ecological conditions in rivers, while restoration
effects vary among organism groups and ES, with plant abundance and
regulating services being restored most effectively. Moreover, a slightly
positive correlation was found between biodiversity and ES, and only
regulating services showed a positive trend with restoration age.
For river restoration practitioners, firstly, we would suggest them to
monitor the restoration projects with long time series to reveal the true
effects of river restoration (Woolsey et al., 2005; Kollmann et al., 2016)
and the clear relationships between biodiversity and ES. Secondly, re-
storation techniques like channel reconfiguration and riparian buffer
establishment, rather than the addition of wood, boulder or gravel, may
be more effective in the river restoration based on our results; and more
attention should be paid to the contexts of hydromorphological de-
gradation and land-use change when prioritizing restoration areas.
For river restoration effect evaluation researchers, when integrating
the effects (e.g. meta-analysis), it would be much better to get more
indices related with biodiversity and ecosystem services. In addition,
researchers should have strict standards no matter for data collections
or identification of the success of the restoration projects.
Acknowledgments
This study was supported by the Chinese National Natural Science
Foundation (51578395) and the Fundamental Research Funds for the
Central Universities. The authors are grateful to Leonardo Teixeira for
commenting on the statistical analyses. Weiwei Lu also thanks the
China Scholarship Council for supporting her study at the Technical
University of Munich, Germany. The constructive comments of expert
reviewers on earlier versions of this manuscript are appreciated.
W. Lu, et al. Ecological Engineering 136 (2019) 30–37

Declaration of Competing Interest Hedges, L.V., Gurevitch, J., Curtis, P.S., 1999. The meta-analysis of response ratios in
experimental ecology. Ecology 80, 1150–1156.
Hering, D., Borja, A., Carvalho, L., Feld, C.K., 2013. Assessment and recovery of European
None. water bodies: key messages from the WISER project. Hydrobiologia 704, 1–9.
Hering, D., Aroviita, J., Baattrup-Pedersen, A., Brabec, K., Buijse, T., Ecke, F., Friberg, N.,
Appendix A. Supplementary data Gielczewski, M., Januschke, K., Köhler, J., Kupilas, B., Lorenz, A.W., Muhar, S.,
Paillex, A., Poppe, M., Schmidt, T., Schmutz, S., Vermaat, J., 2015. Contrasting the
roles of section length and instream habitat enhancement for river restoration suc-
Supplementary data to this article can be found online at https:// cess: a field study of 20 European restoration projects. J. Appl. Ecol. 52, 1518–1527.
doi.org/10.1016/j.ecoleng.2019.06.004. Inglett, P.W., Inglett, K.S., Reddy, K.R., 2008. Biogeochemical processes and implications
for nutrient cycling. Report in report titled “Summary and synthesis of the available
literature on the effects of nutrients on spring organisms and systems” submitted to
References FDEP Springs Initiative.
Jähnig, S.C., Lorenz, A.W., Hering, D., Antons, C., Sundermann, A., Jedicke, E., Haase, P.,
2011. River restoration success: a question of perception. Ecol. Appl. 21, 2007–2015.
Acuña, V., Díez, J.R., Flores, L., Meleason, M., Elosegi, A., 2013. Does it make economic
Januschke, K., Sundermann, A., Antons, C., Haase, P., Lorenz, A., Hering, D., Aue, D.,
sense to restore rivers for their ecosystem services? J. Appl. Ecol. 50, 988–997.
2009. Untersuchung und Auswertung von ausgewählten Renaturierungsbeispielen
Allan, J.D., Castillo, M.M., 2007. Stream Ecology: Structure and Function of Running
repräsentativer Fließgewässertypen der Flusseinzugsgebiete Deutschlands. Deutscher
Waters. Chapman & Hall, NY.
Rat für Landespflege 82, 23–39.
Antón, A., Elosegi, A., García-Arberas, L., Díez, J., Rallo, A., 2011. Restoration of dead
Jones, C.G., Lawton, J.H., Shachak, M., 1994. Organisms as ecosystem engineers. Oikos
wood in Basque stream channels: effects on brown trout population. Ecol. Freshwater
69, 373–386.
Fish 20, 461–471.
Kail, J., Brabec, K., Poppe, M., Januschke, K., 2015. The effect of river restoration on fish,
Bauer, M., Harzer, R., Strobl, K., Kollmann, J., 2018. Resilience of riparian vegetation
macroinvertebrates and aquatic macrophytes: a meta-analysis. Ecol. Indic. 58,
after restoration measures on River Inn. River Res. Appl. 18, 1–10.
311–321.
Bernhardt, E.S., Palmer, M.A., Allan, J.D., Alexander, G., Barnas, K., Brooks, S., Carr, J.,
Kollmann, J., Meyer, S.T., Bateman, R., Conradi, T., Gossner, M.M., Souza Mendonça, M.,
Clayton, S., Dahm, C., Follstad-Shah, J., Galat, D., Gloss, S., Goodwin, P., Hart, D.,
Fernandes, G.W., Hermann, J.M., Koch, C., Müller, S.C., Oki, Y., Overbeck, G.E.,
Hassett, B., Jenkinson, R., Katz, S., Kondolf, G.M., Lake, P.S., Lave, R., Meyer, J.L.,
Paterno, G.B., Rosenfield, M.F., Toma, T.S.P., Weisser, W.W., 2016. Integrating
O’Donnell, T.K., Pagano, L., Powell, B., Sudduth, E., 2005. Synthesizing US river
ecosystem functions into restoration ecology-recent advances and future directions.
restoration efforts. Science 308, 636–637.
Restor. Ecol. 24, 722–730.
Besacier-Monbertrand, A.L., Paillex, A., Castella, E., 2014. Short-term impacts of lateral
Kondolf, G.M., 1995. Five elements for effective evaluation of stream restoration. Restor.
hydrological connectivity restoration on aquatic macroinvertebrates. River Res. Appl.
Ecol. 3, 133–136.
30, 557–570.
Kupilas, B., Hering, D., Lorenz, A.W., Knuth, C., Gücker, B., 2017. Hydromorphological
Bond, N.R., Lake, P.S., 2005. Ecological restoration and large-scale ecological dis-
restoration stimulates river ecosystem metabolism. Biogeosciences 14, 1989.
turbance: the effects of drought on the response by fish to a habitat restoration ex-
Lepori, F., Palm, D., Brännäs, E., Malmqvist, B., 2005. Does restoration of structural
periment. Restor. Ecol. 13, 39–48.
heterogeneity in streams enhance fish and macroinvertebrate diversity? Ecol. Appl.
Borenstein, M., Hedges, L.V., Higgins, J.P., Rothstein, H.R., 2009. Introduction to Meta-
15, 2060–2071.
analysis. Wiley, Chichester, UK.
Li, K., He, C., Zhuang, J., Zhang, Z., Xiang, H., Wang, Z., Yang, H., Sheng, L., 2014. Long-
Brederveld, R.J., Jähnig, S.C., Lorenz, A.W., Brunzel, S., Soons, M.B., 2011. Dispersal as a
term changes in the water quality and macroinvertebrate communities of a sub-
limiting factor in the colonization of restored mountain streams by plants and mac-
tropical river in South China. Water 7, 63–80.
roinvertebrates. J. Appl. Ecol. 48, 1241–1250.
Lorenz, A.W., Korte, T., Sundermann, A., Januschke, K., Haase, P., 2012. Macrophytes
Brosse, S., Arbuckle, C.J., Townsend, C.R., 2003. Habitat scale and biodiversity: influence
respond to reach-scale river restorations. J. Appl. Ecol. 49, 202–212.
of catchment, stream reach and bedform scales on local invertebrate diversity.
Lorenz, A.W., Stoll, S., Sundermann, A., Haase, P., 2013. Do adult and YOY fish benefit
Biodivers. Conserv. 12, 2057–2075.
from river restoration measures? Ecol. Eng. 61, 174–181.
Bukaveckas, P.A., 2007. Effects of channel restoration on water velocity, transient sto-
Louhi, P., Vehanen, T., Huusko, A., Mäki-Petäys, A., Muotka, T., 2016. Long-term mon-
rage, and nutrient uptake in a channelized stream. Environ. Sci. Technol. 41,
itoring reveals the success of salmonid habitat restoration. Can. J. Fish. Aquat. Sci.
1570–1576.
73, 1733–1741.
Cheung, M.W.L., 2014. Modeling dependent effect sizes with three-level meta-analyses: a
Matthaei, C.H., Peacock, K.A., Townsend, C.R., 1999. Scour and fill patterns in a New
structural equation modeling approach. Psychol. Methods 19, 211–229.
Zealand stream and potential implications for invertebrate refugia. Freshwater Biol.
Cheung, M.W.L., 2015. metaSEM: an R package for meta-analysis using structural
42, 41–57.
equation modeling. Front. Psychol. 5, 1521.
McManamay, R.A., Orth, D.J., Dolloff, C.A., 2013. Macroinvertebrate community re-
Chung, K.C., Burns, P.B., Kim, H.M., 2006. A practical guide to meta-analysis. J. Hand
sponses to gravel addition in a southeastern regulated river. Southeast. Nat. 12,
Surg. 31, 1671–1678.
599–618.
de Jong, M.V.Z., Cowx, I.G., 2016. Long-term response of salmonid populations to habitat
McMillan, S.K., Tuttle, A.K., Jennings, G.D., Gardner, A., 2014. Influence of restoration
restoration in a boreal forest stream. Ecol. Eng. 91, 148–157.
age and riparian vegetation on reach-scale nutrient retention in restored urban
Del Re, A.C., 2013. compute. es: Compute effect sizes. R package version 0.2, 2.
streams. J. Am. Water Resour. As. 50, 626–638.
Dolph, C.L., Eggert, S.L., Magner, J., Ferrington Jr., L.C., Vondracek, B., 2015. Reach-
MEA, 2005. Ecosystem and Human Well-being: Biodiversity Synthesis. World Resources
scale stream restoration in agricultural streams of southern Minnesota alters struc-
Institute, Washington, DC.
tural and functional responses of macroinvertebrates. Freshw. Sci. 34, 535–546.
Miller, S.W., Budy, P., Schmidt, J.C., 2010. Quantifying macroinvertebrate responses to
Downs, P.W., Singer, M.S., Orr, B.K., Diggory, Z.E., Church, T.C., 2011. Restoring eco-
in-stream habitat restoration: applications of meta-analysis to river restoration.
logical integrity in highly regulated rivers: the role of baseline data and analytical
Restor. Ecol. 18, 8–19.
references. Environ. Manage. 48, 847–864.
Moreno-Mateos, D., Power, M.E., Comín, F.A., Yockteng, R., 2012. Structural and func-
Egger, M., Smith, G.D., Schneider, M., Minder, C., 1997. Bias in meta-analysis detected by
tional loss in restored wetland ecosystems. PLoS Biol. 10, e1001247.
a simple, graphical test. BMJ 315, 629–634.
Mueller, M., Pander, J., Geist, J., 2014. The ecological value of stream restoration mea-
Erwin, S.O., Jacobson, R.B., Elliott, C.M., 2017. Quantifying habitat benefits of channel
sures: an evaluation on ecosystem and target species scales. Ecol. Eng. 62, 129–139.
reconfigurations on a highly regulated river system, Lower Missouri River, USA. Ecol.
Muotka, T., Paavola, R., Haapala, A., Novikmec, M., Laasonen, P., 2002. Long-term re-
Eng. 103, 59–75.
covery of stream habitat structure and benthic invertebrate communities from in-
Feld, C.K., Hering, D., 2007. Community structure or function: effects of environmental
stream restoration. Biol. Conserv. 105, 243–253.
stress on benthic macroinvertebrates at different spatial scales. Freshwater Biol. 52,
Neale, M.W., Moffett, E.R., 2016. Re-engineering buried urban streams: daylighting re-
1380–1399.
sults in rapid changes in stream invertebrate communities. Ecol. Eng. 87, 175–184.
Friberg, N., Baattrup-Pedersen, A., Kristensen, E.A., Kronvang, B., Larsen, S.E., Pedersen,
Nilsson, C., Aradottir, A.L., Hagen, D., Halldórsson, G., Høegh, K., Mitchell, R.J., Raulund-
M.L., Skriver, J., Thodsen, H., Wiberg-Larsen, P., 2014. The River Gelså restoration
Rasmussen, K., Svavarsdóttir, K., Tolvanen, A., Wilson, S.D., 2016. Evaluating the
revisited: habitat specific assemblages and persistence of the macroinvertebrate
process of ecological restoration. Ecol. Soc. 21, 41.
community over an 11-year period. Ecol. Eng. 66, 150–157.
Ock, G., Gaeuman, D., McSloy, J., Kondolf, G.M., 2015. Ecological functions of restored
Giling, D.P., Mac Nally, R., Thompson, R.M., 2016. How sensitive are invertebrates to
gravel bars, the Trinity River, California. Ecol. Eng. 83, 49–60.
riparian-zone replanting in stream ecosystems? Mar. Freshwater Res. 67, 1500–1511.
Olden, J.D., Konrad, C.P., Melis, T.S., Kennard, M.J., Freeman, M.C., Mims, M.C., Bray,
Gurevitch, J., Hedges, L.V., 1999. Statistical issues in ecological meta-analyses. Ecology
E.N., Gido, K.B., Hemphill, N.P., Lytle, D.A., McMullen, L.E., Pyron, M., Robinson,
80, 1142–1149.
C.T., Schmidt, J.C., Williams, J.G., 2014. Are large-scale flow experiments informing
Haase, P., Hering, D., Jähnig, S.C., Lorenz, A.W., Sundermann, A., 2013. The impact of
the science and management of freshwater ecosystems? Front. Ecol. Environ. 12,
hydromorphological restoration on river ecological status: a comparison of fish,
176–185.
benthic invertebrates, and macrophytes. Hydrobiologia 704, 475–488.
Paillex, A., Schuwirth, N., Lorenz, A.W., Januschke, K., Peter, A., Reichert, P., 2017.
Hahn, S.S., 1982. Stream channelization: effect on stream fauna. In: Greeson, P.E. (Ed.),
Integrating and extending ecological river assessment: concept and test with two
Biota and Biological Principles of the Aquatic Environment. USGS: Circular, pp.
restoration projects. Ecol. Indic. 72, 131–141.
43–49.
Palmer, M.A., Bernhardt, E.S., Allan, J.D., Lake, P.S., Alexander, G., Brooks, S., Carr, J.,
Hasselquist, E.M., Nilsson, C., Hjältén, J., Jørgensen, D., Lind, L., Polvi, L.E., 2015. Time
Clayton, S., Dahm, C.N., Follstad Shah, J., Galat, D.L., Loss, S.G., Goodwin, P., Hart,
for recovery of riparian plants in restored northern Swedish streams: a chronose-
D.D., Hassett, B., Jenkinson, R., Kondolf, G.M., Lave, R., Meyer, J.L., O’Donnell, T.K.,
quence study. Ecol. Appl. 25, 1373–1389.
Pagano, L., Sudduth, E., 2005. Standards for ecologically successful river restoration.

36
W. Lu, et al.
J. Appl. Ecol. 42, 208–217.
Palmer, M.A., Menninger, H.L., Bernhardt, E., 2010. River restoration, habitat hetero-
geneity and biodiversity: a failure of theory or practice? Freshwater Biol. 55,
205–222.
Palmer, M.A., Hondula, K.L., Koch, B.J., 2014. Ecological restoration of streams and
rivers: shifting strategies and shifting goals. Annu. Rev. Ecol. Evol. S. 45, 247–269.
Pan, B., Yuan, J., Zhang, X., Wang, Z., Chen, J., Lu, J., Yang, W., Chen, J., Li, Z., Zhao, N.,
Xu, M., 2016. A review of ecological restoration techniques in fluvial rivers. Int. J.
Sediment Res. 31, 110–119.
Pander, J., Geist, J., 2013. Ecological indicators for stream restoration success. Ecol.
Indic. 30, 106–118.
Pander, J., Mueller, M., Geist, J., 2015. A comparison of four stream substratum re-
storation techniques concerning interstitial conditions and downstream effects. River
Res. Appl. 31, 239–255.
Pedersen, M.L., Friberg, N., Skriver, J., Baattrup-Pedersen, A., Larsen, S.E., 2007.
Restoration of Skjern River and its valley short-term effects on river habitats, mac-
rophytes and macroinvertebrates. Ecol. Eng. 30, 145–156.
Reeves, D.B., Tate, W.B., Jelks, H.L., Jordan, F., 2016. Response of imperiled Okaloosa
Darters to stream restoration. N. Am. J. Fish. Manage. 36, 1375–1385.
Renöfält, B.M., Lejon, A.G., Jonsson, M., Nilsson, C., 2013. Long-term taxon-specific re-
sponses of macroinvertebrates to dam removal in a mid-sized Swedish stream. River
Res. Appl. 29, 1082–1089.
Rey Benayas, J.M., Newton, A.C., Diaz, A., Bullock, J.M., 2009. Enhancement of biodi-
versity and ecosystem services by ecological restoration: a meta-analysis. Science
325, 1121–1124.
Ribot, M., Bernal, S., Nikolakopoulou, M., Vaessen, T.N., Cochero, J., Gacia, E., Sorolla,
A., Argerich, A., Sabater, F., Isnard, M., Martí, E., 2017. Enhancement of carbon and
nitrogen removal by helophytes along subsurface water flowpaths receiving treated
wastewater. Sci. Total Environ. 599, 1667–1676.
Rosi-Marshall, E.J., Moerke, A.H., Lamberti, G.A., 2006. Ecological responses to trout
habitat rehabilitation in a Northern Michigan stream. Environ. Manage. 38, 99–107.
Rubin, Z., Kondolf, G.M., Rios-Touma, B., 2017. Evaluating stream restoration projects:
what do we learn from monitoring? Water 9, 174.
Saldi-Caromile, K., Bates, K., Skidmore, P.A., Barenti, J., Pineo, D., 2004. Stream habitat
restoration guidelines: Final draft. Co-published by the Washington Departments of
Fish and Wildlife and Ecology and the U.S. WA: Fish and Wildlife Service.
Sand-Jensen, K., 1997. Macrophytes as biological engineers in the ecology of Danish
streams. In: Sand-Jensen, K., Pedersen, O. (Eds.), Freshwater Biology. Priorities and
Development in Danish Research. G.E.C. Gad, Copenhagen, pp. 74–101.
37
Ecological Engineering 136 (2019) 30–37
Sand-Jensen, K., Riis, T., Markager, S., Vincent, W.F., 1999. Slow growth and decom-
position of mosses in Arctic lakes. Can. J. Fish. Aquat. Sci. 56, 388–393.
Sarriquet, P.E., Bordenave, P., Marmonier, P., 2007. Effects of bottom sediment restora-
tion on interstitial habitat characteristics and benthic macroinvertebrate assemblages
in a headwater stream. River Res. Appl. 23, 815–828.
Scheiner, S.M., Gurevitch, J., 2001. Design and Analysis of Ecological Experiments.
Oxford University Press, Oxford.
Schmutz, S., Kremser, H., Melcher, A., Jungwirth, M., Muhar, S., Waidbacher, H., Zauner,
G., 2014. Ecological effects of rehabilitation measures at the Austrian Danube: a
meta-analysis of fish assemblages. Hydrobiologia 729, 49–60.
Stoll, S., Kail, J., Lorenz, A.W., Sundermann, A., Haase, P., 2014. The importance of the
regional species pool, ecological species traits and local habitat conditions for the
colonization of restored river reaches by fish. PLoS One 9, e84741.
Sundermann, A., Stoll, S., Haase, P., 2011. River restoration success depends on the
species pool of the immediate surroundings. Ecol. Appl. 21, 1962–1971.
Testa, S.I.I.I., Douglas Shields Jr., F., Cooper, C.M., 2011. Macroinvertebrate esponse to
stream restoration by large wood addition. Ecohydrology 4, 631–643.
Tockner, K., Uehlinger, U., Robinson, C.T., 2009. Rivers of Europe. Academic Press,
Heidelberg.
Tullos, D.D., Penrose, D.L., Jennings, G.D., Cope, W.G., 2009. Analysis of functional traits
in reconfigured channels: implications for the bioassessment and disturbance of river
restoration. J. N. Am. Benthol. Soc. 28, 80–92.
Valentina, S.S., Momir, P., Branko, M., Vasil, K., Milica, R., Donka, M., 2011. Water
quality assessment based on the macroinvertebrate fauna-the Pcinja River case study.
Water Res. Manage. 1, 63–69.
Vehanen, T., Huusko, A., Mäki-Petäys, A., Mykrä, H., Muotka, T., 2010. Effects of habitat
rehabilitation on brown trout (Salmo trutta) in boreal forest streams. Freshwater Biol.
55, 2200–2214.
Viechtbauer, W., 2010. Conducting meta-analyses in R with the metafor package. J. Stat.
Softw. 36, 1–48.
Whiteway, S.L., Biron, P.M., Zimmermann, A., Venter, O., Grant, J.W., 2010. Do in-stream
restoration structures enhance salmonid abundance? A meta-analysis. Can. J. Fish.
Aquat. Sci. 67, 831–841.
Woolsey, S., Weber, C., Gonser, T., Hoehn, E., Hostmann, M., Junker, B., Roulier, C.,
Schweizer, S., Tiegs, S., Tockner, K., Peter, A., 2005. Handbook for Evaluating
Rehabilitation Projects in Rivers and Streams. EAWAG/WSL, Zurich.
Wu, J., Cheng, S., Li, Z., Guo, W., Zhong, F., Yin, D., 2013. Case study on rehabilitation of
a polluted urban water body in Yangtze River Basin. Environ. Sci. Pollut. Res. 20,
7038–7045.