BEHAVIOR OF STRIP FOOTING RESTING ON SOFT GROUND STIFFENED BY GRANULAR PILES

Basuony El-Garhy1* and Mohamed Elsawy2
Page No. 1- 12

This paper presents a method to analyze strip footing resting on granular layer over soft ground
improved by granular piles (i.e., end bearing or floating). The granular layer beneath the strip
footing is idealized as incompressible shear layer. The natural weak soil layer is idealized by soft
Winkler springs and the granular piles is idealized as stiff Winkler springs. These springs is
connected at their heads by a thin membrane under uniform tension to overcome the drawbacks of
Winkler model related to the continuum nature of the soil. The finite element method is used to solve
the problem under consideration. The granular piles of different lengths, diameters and stiffness can
be modeled by the present analysis method. Validation of the proposed analysis method through
comparisons with field measurements, predicted results by other analysis method and results of
PLAXIS program are investigated.