Author(s)

D. D. Theodorakopoulos & D. E. Beskos

Abstract

The dynamic response of a pair of rigid retaining walls experiencing base rotation due to horizontal harmonic ground shaking is studied analytically under conditions of plane strain. The retained material is idealized as a uniform, fully saturated poroelastic (with or without hysteretic damping) layer of soil of constant thickness obeying Biot’s dynamic poroelastic theory. In the analysis, emphasis is given to the calculation of the wall rotation angle. Parametric and comparison studies are conducted in order to assess the effect of various parameters, such as the rotational flexibility of the wall constraint, the properties of the retained medium and the distance between the walls, on the response. It is shown that, for a system experiencing base rotation, the resulted wall forces are much lower than those obtained for fixed-based rigid walls. Keywords: pair of retaining walls, poroelastic soil, harmonic seismic excitation, wall rotation, dynamic response. 1 Introduction The study of the dynamic behavior of retaining walls is of great importance in the area of geotechnical / structural transportation facilities. The available methods of dynamic / seismic response of retaining walls can be grouped into three categories [1, 2] depending mainly on the degree of modeling elaboration of the soil material. In the present work the dynamic wall pressures and the associated forces on a pair of rigid walls experiencing base rotation and retaining a uniform, fully water-saturated layer of soil are evaluated. The problem is solved analytically / numerically under conditions of plane strain. Wall pressures and forces are induced by horizontal ground shaking harmonically varying with time and

Keywords

pair of retaining walls, poroelastic soil, harmonic seismic excitation, wall rotation, dynamic response.