Field Tests on Pile-Supported Embankments over Soft Ground
Publication: Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Volume 136, Issue 6
Abstract
When designing embankments over soft soils, geotechnical engineers face many challenges. These include potential bearing failure, intolerable settlement, and global or local instability. Pile-supported embankments have been emerged as an effective alternative successfully adopted worldwide to solve these problems. This paper focuses on three cases in which pile-supported embankments were used for constructing highways in the eastern coastal region of China. Each case provides a description of the soil profile, construction procedure, and field monitoring of the settlements, earth pressures, and pore-water pressures. Field monitored data from contact pressures acting on the piles and the soils, to the settlements of the piles and the soils are reported and discussed. The development of the earth pressures both on the piles and the soils shows that there was a significant soil arching in the embankment, and the measured earth pressures acting on the piles are much higher than that acting on the soils between the piles. The measured differential settlements between the piles and the soils are small. The pore-water pressures are not significant compared to the embankment loads. Most pore-water pressure dissipated after the complete of filling. The measurements have proven the effectiveness of this technique in reducing total and differential settlements. Finally, the available design standards and approaches are verified by three cases.
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Acknowledgments
The work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Project No. NNSFC50878193), and Program for New Century Excellent Talents in University (NCET) for financial support.
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Received: Oct 2, 2008
Accepted: Nov 20, 2009
Published online: Nov 25, 2009
Published in print: Jun 2010
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