Recycled Plastic Pins for General Slope Failures—A Case Study
Publication: Geo-Congress 2022
ABSTRACT
Slope failures occur along state roads and highways costing the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) millions of dollars in repairs every year. Texas highway slopes built on high-plastic clays experience cycles of wet and dry seasons annually. The highway slopes usually fail after a prolonged rainfall event due to rainwater infiltration into the soil. Slope failures cause serious damage to highway infrastructure like guardrails, pavement, and shoulders. Highway slope failures are mostly shallow in nature (1.2–1.8 m) but, in some cases, there are deeper slope failures (>2.4 m). Recycled Plastic Pin (RPP) has previously been utilized as a sustainable and cost-effective slope repair method by TxDOT to stabilize shallow slope failures. The objective of the proposed study is to utilize RPP to stabilize general slope failures. A failed slope located at the intersection of northbound side of Interstate 820 and Rosedale Street in Fort Worth, Texas, was selected for the current study. The selected slope failed several times during a period of two months before repair, and the estimated failure depth was between 2.13 and 3 m. A 37 m section of the failed slope was stabilized with RPPs. To stabilize the reoccurring slope failure, few rows of RPPs were driven into deeper depths (up to 4.6 m) using a layered system of pin installation. Since the slope was stabilized using RPP (more than a year ago), the slope section has not experienced any failure.
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Geo-Congress 2022
Pages: 199 - 207
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Published online: Mar 17, 2022
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