Key Trends Regarding the Effects of Site Geometry on Lateral Spreading Displacements
Publication: Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Volume 147, Issue 12
Abstract
Nonlinear, effective stress finite-element analyses are used to model earthquake-induced displacements at lateral spread sites near a free face. The numerical analyses consist of 132 models with model geometries selected to isolate the influence of the height of the free face, the thickness of liquefiable layers, sloping ground behind the free face, and the presence of a topographic terrace on lateral spread displacement patterns. Each model is analyzed in the context of how the geometric factors influence the maximum horizontal displacement, the inland extent of displacements, and the shape of the displacement profile between the free face and the inland extent. For sites with flat ground behind the free face and with no terrace present, the dominant factor controlling the displacement pattern is the combined thickness of the free face and underlying liquefiable soil. Lateral spread displacements are significantly affected by the presence of sloping ground behind the free face, with the inland extent affected more significantly than the maximum displacement. The presence of a topographic terrace several hundred meters from a free face can increase appreciably the displacements in the area between the free face and terrace. A bilinear surface model is proposed as a framework for predicting displacement patterns at a free-face lateral spread site and used to model the displacements from the numerical simulations. The observations in this study are based only on a single input ground motion, but the framework can be extended with additional analyses utilizing a range of earthquake ground motions.
Get full access to this article
View all available purchase options and get full access to this article.
Data Availability Statement
Some or all data, models, or code generated or used during the study are available in a DesignSafe (www.designsafe-ci.org) repository (Little and Rathje 2021) online in accordance with funder data retention policies.
Acknowledgments
This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. 1462855. This support is gratefully acknowledged. We would also like to thank Professor Pedro Arduino and Dr. Long Chen from the University of Washington for sharing initial versions of their SSPQuadUP element, OpenSees PM4Sand implementation, and GiD problem type, and for helping troubleshoot the use of these tools.
References
Boulanger, R., and I. Idriss. 2014. CPT and SPT based liquefaction triggering procedures. CPT and SPT based liquefaction triggering procedures.. Davis, CA: Center for Geotechnical Modeling, Univ. of California at Davis.
Boulanger, R., and K. Ziotopoulou. 2013. “Formulation of a sand plasticity plane-strain model for earthquake engineering applications.” Soil Dyn. Earthquake Eng. 53 (Oct): 254–267. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.soildyn.2013.07.006.
Boulanger, R., and K. Ziotopoulou. 2017. PM4Sand (version 3.1): A sand plasticity model for earthquake engineering applications.. Davis, CA: Center for Geotechnical Modeling, Univ. of California at Davis.
Chang, D., T. Travasarou, and J. Chacko. 2008. “Numerical evaluation of liquefaction-induced uplift for an immersed tunnel.” In Proc., 14th World Conf. on Earthquake Engineering. Beijing: National Information Center of Earthquake Engineering.
Chen, L., and P. Arduino. 2021. Implementation, verification, and validation of PM4Sand model in OpenSees. Berkeley, CA: Univ. of California, Berkeley.
Chen, L., A. Ghofrani, and P. Arduino. 2020. “Remarks on numerical simulation of the LEAP-Asia-2019 centrifuge tests.” Soil Dyn. Earthquake Eng. 142 (Mar): 106541. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.soildyn.2020.106541.
Chu, D., J. Stewart, T. L. Youd, and B. Chu. 2006. “Liquefaction-induced lateral spreading in near-fault regions during the 1999 Chi-Chi, Taiwan earthquake.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng. 132 (12): 1549–1565. https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)1090-0241(2006)132:12(1549).
Cubrinovski, M., and K. Robinson. 2016. “Lateral spreading: Evidence and interpretation from the 2010-2011 Christchurch earthquakes.” Soil Dyn. Earthquake Eng. 91 (Dec): 187–201. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.soildyn.2016.09.045.
Howell, R., E. Rathje, and R. Boulanger. 2015. “Evaluation of simulation models of lateral spread sites treated with prefabricated vertical drains.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng. 141 (1): 04014076. https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)GT.1943-5606.0001185.
Kramer, S. 1996. Geotechnical earthquake engineering. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Little, M., and E. Rathje. 2021. “Simulating the effects of site geometry on lateral spread displacements.” In Numerical modeling of lateral spread displacements at free-face sites using OpenSees. Alexandria, VA: DesignSafe-CI, National Science Foundation. https://doi.org/10.17603/ds2-vn2w-nx44.
Little, M. V., E. Rathje, G. P. De Pascale, and J. Bachhuber. 2021. “Insights into lateral spread displacement patterns using remote sensing data from the 2011 Christchurch earthquake.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng. 147 (5): 05021002. https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)GT.1943-5606.0002491.
Lysmer, J., and A. Kuhlemeyer. 1969. “Finite dynamic model for infinite media.” J. Eng. Mech. Div. 95 (4): 859–877. https://doi.org/10.1061/JMCEA3.0001144.
McGann, C., and P. Arduino. 2011. “Dynamic 2D effective stress analysis of slope—OpenSeesWiki.” Accessed May 18, 2020. https://opensees.berkeley.edu/wiki/index.php/Dynamic_2D_Effective_Stress_Analysis_of_Slope.
McGann, C., P. Arduino, and P. Mackenzie-Helnwein. 2012. “Stabilized single-point 4-node quadrilateral element for dynamic analysis of fluid saturated porous media.” Acta Geotech. 7 (4): 297–311. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11440-012-0168-5.
McKenna, F. 1997. “Object-oriented finite element programming: Frameworks for analysis, algorithms and parallel computing.” Ph.D. dissertation, Dept. of Civil Engineering, Univ. of California–Berkeley.
NASEM (National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine). 2016. State of the art and practice in the assessment of earthquake-induced soil liquefaction and its consequences. Washington, DC: National Academies Press. https://doi.org/1017226/23474.
Qiu, Z., and A. Elgamal. 2020. “Numerical simulations of LEAP centrifuge tests for seismic response of liquefiable sloping ground.” Soil Dyn. Earthquake Eng. 139 (Dec): 106378. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.soildyn.2020.106378.
Qiu, Z., J. Lu, A. Elgamal, and L. Su. 2019. “OpenSees three-dimensional computational modeling of ground-structure systems and liquefaction scenarios.” Comput. Modell. Eng. Sci. 120 (3): 629–656. https://doi.org/10.32604/cmes.2019.05759.
Rathje, E., et al. 2017. “DesignSafe: A new cyberinfrastructure for natural hazards engineering.” Nat. Hazards Rev. 18 (3): 06017001. https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)NH.1527-6996.0000246.
Russel, J., S. van Ballegooy, M. Ogden, S. Bastin, and M. Cubrinovksi. 2017. “Influence of geometric, geologic, geomorphic and subsurface ground conditions on the accuracy of empirical models for prediction of lateral spreading.” In Proc., 3rd Int. Conf. on Performance Based Design in Earthquake Geotechnical Engineering, ISSMGE-TC203. Beijing: International Society for Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering.
Srivastava, T. 2019. “Evaluation metrics for machine learning|model evaluation.” Accessed May 18, 2020. https://www.analyticsvidhya.com/blog/2019/08/11-important-model-evaluation-error-metrics/.
Youd, T., C. Hansen, and S. Bartlett. 2002. “Revised multilinear regression equations for prediction of lateral spread displacement.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng. 128 (12): 1007–1017. https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)1090-0241(2002)128:12(1007).
Zhang, G., P. Robertson, and R. Brachman. 2004. “Estimating liquefaction-induced lateral displacements using the standard penetration test or cone penetration test.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng. 130 (8): 861–871. https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)1090-0241(2004)130:8(861).
Zienkiewicz, O. C., M. Huang, and M. Pastor. 1994. “Computational soil dynamics—A new algorithm for drained and undrained conditions.” In Computer methods and advances in geomechanics, edited by H. J. Siriwardane and M. M. Zaman, 47–59. Rotterdam, Netherlands: A.A. Balkema.
Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Copyright
© 2021 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Jan 19, 2021
Accepted: Aug 4, 2021
Published online: Sep 20, 2021
Published in print: Dec 1, 2021
Discussion open until: Feb 20, 2022
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.
Cited by
- Yu-Wei Hwang, Shideh Dashti, Wenyang Zhang, Influence of Bidirectional Horizontal Shaking on Seismic Response of Structure on Liquefiable Soils, Geo-Congress 2024, 10.1061/9780784485316.039, (373-382), (2024).
- Yu-Wei Hwang, Ellen M. Rathje, Insights into seismic slope deformation patterns using finite element analysis, Soil Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering, 10.1016/j.soildyn.2022.107660, 164, (107660), (2023).
- Vladimir A. Osinov, The u‐p approximation versus the exact dynamic equations for anisotropic fluid‐saturated solids. I. Hyperbolicity, International Journal for Numerical and Analytical Methods in Geomechanics, 10.1002/nag.3506, (2023).