Soaking Plate Load Test after Treatment of Soft Clayey Soil for Railway Embankment of Baghdad — Beije New Railway Line

The soft clayey soil exist in the way along with the new railway line between stations 34+000 to 36+000, 45+000 to 49+000, and 64+000 to 65+000, these soils are term of gathering swamps connected by water, that come to them from different trenches near to them, and because of the near area are swale & agriculture it encourages gathering of water and formation of wateriness pools, which encourages the growth of different glassworts like cane & boscage, and it becomes hotbed for animals. The new proposed railway line must interpenetrate these lakes, pools & swamps with total length of 8 km, so there is a need for a suitable treatment for the existing situation. The proposed suggestion was to fill up these swamps to a width of 20 m with boulder to give good stability to the railway embankment later. But what was actual used for filling were a mixture of natural soil and sandy — gravel soil, because these soils were available and can be brought from a place near to the working area, and to make a suitable route for the automations to travel on easily. The soil used in the filling were compacted using available compactors, and to evaluate the efficiency of compaction and soil filling a plate load test were done, but the primary results showed that the soil did not reach the accepted specification, so it was suggested to spread a boulder layer of thickness not less than 30 cm and compacted very good using medium to heavy vibrator compactor then another plate load test were done which its results showed marked improvement in the soil strength and resistance.