Predicting RC Frame Response to Excavation-Induced Settlement
Publication: Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Volume 135, Issue 11
Abstract
In many tunneling and excavation projects, free-field vertical ground movements have been used to predict subsidence, and empirical limits have been employed to evaluate risk. Validity of such approaches is largely unknown given that ground movements are in fact not one-dimensional and that adjacent applied loads are known to have an impact. This paper employed analytical and large-scale experimental efforts to quantify these issues, in the case of excavation adjacent to a reinforced concrete frame with tieback anchors and a sheetpile wall in dry sand. With this flexible system, a disproportionate amount of the soil and building movements occurred prior to installation of the first tieback, even when conservative construction practices were applied. Furthermore, free-field data generated a trough as little as one-half the size of that recorded near the building frames. Empirically based relative gradient limits generally matched the extent and distribution of the damage, while the application of various structural limits did not fully identify local damage distribution but did generally reflect global response. The use of fully free-field data or a failure to include lateral soil displacements both underpredicted building displacements by as much as 50% for low-rise concrete frames without grade beams on sand.
Get full access to this article
View all available purchase options and get full access to this article.
Acknowledgments
The Schnabel Laboratory was made possible through generous funding by the Schnabel Foundation Company, donated technical assistance of Keith Brandau of Frauenhoffer Associates, and institutional leadership from Tony Graziano and David Daniel of UIUC. Experiments were funded by National Science Foundation through Grant No. NSFCMMI9713854 and UIUC and realized through the tireless dedication of several dozen undergraduates. The computational portion of this work was made possible through the funding of Science Foundation Ireland (Grant No. UNSPECIFIEDSFI/PICA/I850).
References
American Concrete Institute (ACI). (1995). Building code requirements for structural concrete (ACI 318-95) and commentary (ACI 318R-95), ACI, Detroit.
Bjerrum, L. (1963). “Discussion session IV.” Proc., European Conf. on Soil Mechanics and Foundation Engineering, Wiesbaden, Germany, 135–137.
Boone, S. J. (1996). “Ground-movement-related building damage.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng., 122(11), 886–896.
Boone, S. J. (2001). “Assessing construction and settlement-induced building damage: a return to fundamental principles.” Proc., Underground Construction, Institution of Mining and Metallurgy, London, 559–570.
Burland, J. B., and Wroth, C. P. (1975). “Settlement of buildings and associated damage.” Proc., Conf. on Settlement of Structures, Pentech, London, 1974, Pentech Press, London, 611–654.
Cording, E. J., and Hansmire, W. H. (1975). “Displacements around soft ground tunnels.” Proc., 5th Pan American Conf. on Soil Mechanics and Foundation Engineering, ASCE, Reston, Va., 571–633.
Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). (2000). “Prestandard and commentary for the seismic rehabilitation of buildings.” FEMA 356, ASCE, Washington, D.C.
Finno, R. J., and Calvello, M. (2005). “Supported excavations: Observational method and inverse modeling.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng., 131(7), 826–836.
Finno, R. J., Voss, F. T., Rossow, E., and Blackburn, J. T. (2005). “Evaluating damage potential in buildings affected by excavations.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng., 131(10), 1199–1210.
Hsieh, P. G., and Ou, C. Y. (1998). “Shape of ground surface settlement profiles caused by excavation.” Can. Geotech. J., 35, 1004–1017.
Laefer, D. F. (2001). “Prediction and assessment of ground movement and building damage induced by adjacent excavation.” Ph.D. thesis, Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Ill.
Liu, G., Houlsby, G. T., and Augarde, C. E. (2000). “2-dimensional analysis of settlement damage to masonry buildings caused by tunneling.” Struct. Eng., 79(1), 19–25.
Meyerhof, G. G. (1947). “The settlement analysis of building frames.” Struct. Eng., 25, 369–409.
Mroueh, H., and Shahrour, I. (2003). “A full 3-D finite element analysis of tunneling-adjacent structures interaction.” Comput. Geotech., 30, 245–253.
Mueller, C. G. (2000). “Behavior of model-scale tieback walls in sand.” Ph.D. thesis, Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Ill.
Park, R., and Paulay, T. (1975). Reinforced concrete structures, Wiley, New York.
Peck, R. B. (1969). “Deep excavation and tunneling in soft ground.” Proc., 7th Int. Conf. on Soil Mechanics and Foundation Engineering, Sociedad Mexicana de Meca nica de Suelos, Mexico, 225–290.
Polshin, D. E., and Tokar, R. A. (1957). “Maximum allowable non-uniform settlement of structures.” Proc., 4th Int. Conf. on Soil Mechanics and Foundation Engineering, Vol. 1, Butterworths, London, 402–405.
Skempton, A. W., and MacDonald, D. H. (1956). “The allowable settlement of buildings.” Proc. Inst. Civ. Eng., Struct. Build., 5, 727–784.
Son, M., and Cording, E. J. (2005). “Estimation of building damage due to excavation-induced ground movements.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng., 131(2), 162–177.
Structural Engineers Association of California (SEAOC). (1995). “Vision 2000: Performance based seismic engineering of buildings: Conceptual framework.” Rep. Prepared for SEAOC, SEAOC, Sacramento, Calif.
Uniform Building Code (UBC). (1997). Proc., UBC 97—Int. Conf. of Building Officials, Vol. 2, International Conference of Building Officials, Baltimore.
Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Volume 135 • Issue 11 • November 2009
Pages: 1605 - 1619
Copyright
© 2009 ASCE.
History
Received: Oct 17, 2008
Accepted: Apr 18, 2009
Published online: Apr 23, 2009
Published in print: Nov 2009
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.