Seismic Design and Parametric Study of Rigid Retaining Walls

Abstract

The main objective of the paper is to develop a simplified procedure for the seismic design of a rigid retaining wall. For the design of a rigid retaining wall various parameters that are taken in to consideration include height of the wall, angle of inclination of backfill, backface angle of the wall, surcharge on backfill, safe bearing pressure of base medium and horizontal as well as vertical seismic acceleration coefficients. Safe design of a wall should satisfy four criteria, namely, factor of safety against sliding shall not exceed given limits, factor of safety against overturning shall be less than its permissible value, maximum pressure at the base of wall shall not exceed safe bearing pressure of the base soil and minimum pressure at the base of wall shall be greater than zero. In this paper an attempt has been made to give a simplified procedure for the seismic design of a rigid retaining wall. A parametric study to check the effect of various parameters affecting the seismic design of wall is carried out.