Numerical Evaluation of Earthquake Settlements of Road Embankments and Mitigation by Preloading
Publication: International Journal of Geomechanics
Volume 16, Issue 5
Abstract
This article presents an assessment of the effects of pore water pressure generation of the soil foundation on the seismic road embankment response. Numerical simulations were carried out to study the preloading technique as an improvement method for reducing the liquefaction potential and the induced settlements in a sandy soil profile. The analyses showed that the use of preloading reduces the induced settlements mostly because of the increase in lateral confinement in the superficial soil layers that results from an increase of the coefficient of lateral earth pressure at rest (). The research also showed that the efficiency of the countermeasure method was limited to cases in which earthquakes produced a liquefaction zone lower than the depth of the overconsolidated soil.
Get full access to this article
View all available purchase options and get full access to this article.
Acknowledgments
This work was funded by the Seventh Framework Programme of the European Community, European Commission Research Executive Agency, under Grant Agreement FP7-SME-2010-1-262161-PREMISERI. The research reported in this article has been supported in part by the SEISM Paris Saclay Research Institute.
References
Adalier, K., and Aydingun, O. (2003). “Numerical analysis of seismically induced liquefaction in earth embankment foundations. Part II. Application of remedial measures.” Can. Geotech. J., 40(4), 766–779.
Adalier, K., and Elgamal, A. W. (2005). “Liquefaction of over-consolidated sand: A centrifuge investigation.” J. Earthquake Eng., 9(S1), 127–150.
Adalier, K., Elgamal, A. W., and Martin, G. (1998). “Foundation liquefaction countermeasures for earth embankments.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng., 500–517.
Arias, A. (1970). “A measure of earthquake intensity.” Seismic design for nuclear power plants, R. J. Hansen (ed.), MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, 438–483.
Aubry, D., Hujeux, J.-C., Lassoudière, F., and Meimon, Y. (1982). “A double memory model with multiple mechanisms for cyclic soil behaviour.” Proc., Int. Symp. on Numerical Models in Geomechanics, Balkema, Netherlands, 3–13.
Bird, J. F., Bommer, J. J., Crowley, H., and Pinho, R. (2006). “Modelling liquefaction-induced building damage in earthquake loss estimation.” Soil Dyn. Earthquake Eng., 26(1), 15–30.
Bouckovalas, G., Stamatopoulos, C. A., and Whitman, R. V. (1991). “Analysis of seismic settlements and pore pressures in centrifuge tests.” J. Geotech. Eng., 1492–1508.
Bouferra, R., Benseddiq, N., and Shahrour, I. (2007). “Saturation and preloading effects on the cyclic behavior of sand.” Int. J. Geomech., 396–401.
Bradley, B. A., Araki, K., Ishii, T., and Saitoh, K. (2013). “Effect of lattice-shaped ground improvement geometry on seismic response of liquefiable soil deposits via 3-D seismic effective stress analysis.” Soil Dyn. Earthquake Eng., 48, 35–47.
Brennan, A. J., and Madabhushi, S. P. G. (2002). “Effectiveness of vertical drains in mitigation of liquefaction.” Soil Dyn. Earthquake Eng., 22(9–12), 1059–1065.
Byrne, P. M., Park, S.-S., Beaty, M., Sharp, M., Gonzalez, L., and Abdoun, T. (2004). “Numerical modeling of liquefaction and comparison with centrifuge tests.” Can. Geotech. J., 41(2), 193–211.
CEN (European Committee for Standardization). (2003). “Design of structures for earthquake resistance, Part 1: General rules, seismic actions and rules for buildings,” Eurocode 8, prEN 1998-1, Brussels, Belgium.
Chousianitis, K., Gaudio, V. D., Kalogeras, I., and Ganas, A. (2014). “Predictive model of Arias intensity and Newmark displacement for regional scale evaluation of earthquake-induced landslide hazard in Greece.” Soil Dyn. Earthquake Eng., 65, 11–29.
Dashti, S., Bray, J. D., Pestana, J. M., Riemer, M., and Wilson, D. (2010a). “Centrifuge testing to evaluate and mitigate liquefaction-induced building settlement mechanisms.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng., 918–29.
Dashti, S., Bray, J. D., Pestana, J. M., Riemer, M., and Wilson, D. (2010b). “Mechanisms of seismically induced settlement of buildings with shallow foundations on liquefiable soil.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng., 151–164.
Elgamal, A. W., Lu, J., and Yang, Z. (2005). “Liquefaction-induced settlement of shallow foundations and remediation: 3D numerical simulation.” J. Earthquake Eng., 9(S1), 17–45.
Elgamal, A. W., Parra, E., Yang, Z., and Adalier, K. (2002). “Numerical analysis of embankment foundation liquefaction countermeasures.” J. Earthquake Eng., 6(4), 447–471.
Hujeux, J. C. (1985). “Une loi de comportement pour le chargement cyclique des sols.” Génie Parasismique, V. Davidovici, Presses ENPC, France, 278–302.
Iervolino, I., and Cornell, C. A. (2005). “Record selection for nonlinear seismic analysis of structures.” Earthquake Spectra, 21(3), 685–713.
Ishihara, K., and Okada, S. (1982). “Effects of large preshearing on cyclic behavior of sand.” Soils Found., 22(3), 109–125.
Kaneko, M., Sasaki, Y., Nishikawa, J., Nagase, M., and Mamiya, K. (1995). “River dike failure in Japan by earthquakes in 1993.” Proc., 3rd Int. Conf. on Recent Advances in Geotechnical Earthquake Engineering and Soil Dynamics, Vol. 1, S. Prakash, ed., Univ. of Missouri, St. Louis, 495–498.
Karamitros, D., Bouckovalas, G., and Chaloulos, Y. (2013). “Insight into the seismic liquefaction performance of shallow foundations.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng., 599–607.
Koutsourelakis, S., Prévost, J. H., and Deodatis, G. (2002). “Risk assessment of an interacting structure-soil system due to liquefaction.” Earthquake Eng. Struct. Dyn., 31(4), 851–879.
Kuhl, D., and Crisfield, M. A. (1999). “Energy-conserving and decaying algorithms in non-linear structural dynamics.” Int. J. Numer. Methods Eng., 45(5), 569–599.
Liu, C., and Xu, J. (2013). “Experimental study on the effects of initial conditions on liquefaction of saturated and unsaturated sand.” Int. J. Geomech., 04014100.
Liu, L., and Dobry, R. (1997). “Seismic response of shallow foundation on liquefiable sand.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng., 557–567.
Lopez-Caballero, F., and Modaressi-Farahmand-Razavi, A. (2008). “Numerical simulation of liquefaction effects on seismic SSI.” Soil Dyn. Earthquake Eng., 28(2), 85–98.
Lopez-Caballero, F., and Modaressi-Farahmand-Razavi, A. (2013). “Numerical simulation of mitigation of liquefaction seismic risk by preloading and its effects on the performance of structures.” Soil Dyn. Earthquake Eng., 49, 27–38.
Lopez-Caballero, F., Modaressi-Farahmand-Razavi, A., and Modaressi, H. (2007). “Nonlinear numerical method for earthquake site response analysis I—Elastoplastic cyclic model and parameter identification strategy.” Bull. Earthquake Eng., 5(3), 303–323.
López-Querol, S., and Blázquez, R. (2006). “Identification of failure mechanisms of road embankments due to liquefaction: Optimal corrective measures at seismic sites.” Can. Geotech. J., 43(9), 889–902.
Lu, J., Elgamal, A., Yan, L., Law, K. H., and Conte, J. P. (2011). “Large-scale numerical modeling in geotechnical earthquake engineering.” Int. J. Geomech., 490–503.
Marcuson, W., Hadala, P., and Ledbetter, R. (1996). “Seismic rehabilitation of earth dams.” J. Geotech. Engrg., 7–20.
Matsuo, O. (1996). “Damage to river dikes.” Soils Found., 36(1), 235–240.
Mitrani, H., and Madabhushi, S. P. G. (2012). “Rigid containment walls for liquefaction remediation.” J. Earthquake Tsunami, 6(3), 1–23.
Modaressi, H., and Benzenati, I. (1994). “Paraxial approximation for poroelastic media.” Soil Dyn. Earthquake Eng., 13(2), 117–129.
Nishimura, S. I., and Shimizu, H. (2008). “Reliability-based design of ground improvement for liquefaction mitigation.” Struct. Saf., 30(3), 200–216.
Okamura, M., Tamamura, S., and Yamamoto, R. (2013). “Seismic stability of embankments subjected to pre-deformation due to foundation consolidation.” Soils Found., 53(1), 11–22.
Petridis, P., Stamatopoulos, C., and Stamatopoulos, A. (2000). “Soil improvement by preloading of two erratic sites.” GeoEng2000, Int. Conf. on Geotechnical and Geological Engineering, Technomic, Melbourne, Australia.
Porcino, D., Marcianò, V., and Ghionna, V. N. (2009). “Influence of cyclic pre-shearing on undrained behaviour of carbonate sand in simple shear tests.” Geomech. Geoeng., 4(2), 151–161.
Raptakis, D. G. (2013). “Pre-loading effect on site response: Site amplification and soil properties mismatch.” Soil Dyn. Earthquake Eng., 53, 1–10.
Rathje, E. M., Abrahamson, N. A., and Bray, J. D. (1998). “Simplified frequency content estimates of earthquake ground motions.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng., 150–159.
Sasaki, Y., Tamura, K., Yamamoto, M., and Ohbayashi, J. (1995). “Soil improvement work for river embankment damage by 1993 Kushiro-oki earthquake.” Proc., 1st Int. Conf. on Earthquake Geotechnical Engineering, Vol. 1, Balkema, Netherlands, 43–48.
SCDOT (South Carolina Department of Transportation). (2010). Geotechnical design manual version 1.1, Columbia, SC.
Seed, H., Wong, R., Idriss, I., and Tokimatsu, K. (1986). “Moduli and damping factors for dynamic analyses of cohesionless soils.” J. Geotech. Engrg., 1016–1032.
Shahir, H., and Pak, A. (2010). “Estimating liquefaction-induced settlement of shallow foundations by numerical approach.” Comput. Geotech., 37(3), 267–279.
Shinozuka, M., and Ohtomo, K. (1989). “Spatial severity of liquefaction.” Proc., 2nd US-Japan Workshop in Liquefaction, Large Ground Deformation and Their Effects on Lifelines, Technical Report NCEER-89-0032, National Center for Earthquake Engineering Research, Buffalo, NY, 193–206.
Sorrentino, L., Kunnath, S., Monti, G., and Scalora, G. (2008). “Seismically induced one-sided rocking response of unreinforced masonry façades.” Eng. Struct., 30(8), 2140–2153.
Stamatopoulos, A. C., and Kotzias, P. C. (1985). Soil improvement by preloading, John Wiley and Sons, New York.
Stamatopoulos, C., et al. (2013). “Improvement of dynamic soil properties induced by preloading verified by a field test.” Eng. Geol., 163(1), 101 –112.
Stamatopoulos, C., Petridis, P., Bassanou, M., and Stamatopoulos, A. (2005). “Increase in horizontal stress induced by preloading.” Proc. Inst. Civ. Eng. Ground Improv., 9(2), 47–51.
Stamatopoulos, C. A., and Stamatopoulos, A. (2007). “Effect of preloading on the cyclic strength of reconstituted sand.” Proc. Inst. Civ. Eng. Ground Improv., 11(3), 145–155.
Tika, T. E., and Pitilakis, K. D. (1999). “Liquefaction induced failure of a bridge embankment.” Proc., 2nd Int. Conf. on Earthquake Geotechnical Engineering, Balkema, Netherlands, 631–636.
Unjoh, S., Kaneko, M., Kataoka, S., Nagaya, K., and Matsuoka, K. (2012). “Effect of earthquake ground motions on soil liquefaction.” Soils Found., 52(5), 830–841.
Wichtmann, T., Niemunis, A., Triantafyllidis, T., and Poblete, M. (2005). “Correlation of cyclic preloading with the liquefaction resistance.” Soil Dyn. Earthquake Eng., 25(12), 923–932.
Xu, L. Y., et al. (2013). “Numerical assessment of liquefaction mitigation effects on residential houses: Case histories of the 2007 Niigata Chuetsu-offshore earthquake.” Soil Dyn. Earthquake Eng., 53, 196–209.
Yasuda, S. (2007). “Remediation methods again st liquefaction which can be applied to existing structures.” Earthquake geotechnical engineering, K. D. Pitilakis, ed., Springer, Netherlands, 385–406.
Youd, T. L. (1993). “Liquefaction-induced damage to bridges.” Transportation Research Record, 1411, 35–41.
Zienkiewicz, O. C., and Taylor, R. L. (1991). The finite element method, solid and fluid mechanics, dynamics and non-linearity, Vol. 2, 4th ed., McGraw-Hill, London.
Information & Authors
Information
Published In
International Journal of Geomechanics
Volume 16 • Issue 5 • October 2016
Copyright
© 2015 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Sep 2, 2014
Accepted: Jul 23, 2015
Published online: Jan 20, 2016
Discussion open until: Jun 20, 2016
Published in print: Oct 1, 2016
Authors
Metrics & Citations
Metrics
Citations
Download citation
If you have the appropriate software installed, you can download article citation data to the citation manager of your choice. Simply select your manager software from the list below and click Download.