Performance of Modular-Reinforced Soil-Retaining Walls for an Intercity Railway during Service

Abstract

In order to investigate the mechanical behavior of reinforced soil-retaining walls during service, this paper carried out a long-term remote observation test for 6 years on the modular-reinforced soil-retaining wall of the Qingrong intercity railway in eastern China’s Shandong Province. During the construction period, earth pressure boxes, flexible displacement meters, settlement pipes and displacement meters were buried to observe the soil pressure, reinforcement strain, horizontal displacement and settlement of the reinforced earth-retaining wall, respectively, for a long time; then, the results were analyzed to summarize its variation law. The results show that the reinforced earth-retaining wall was stable after one year of construction. It was determined that the strain of reinforcement in each layer decreased with time, culminating in a value of less than 0.88 percent during the 6th year. The maximum horizontal displacement of the wall was 11.43 mm and the maximum settlement of the wall top was 46.77 mm, which were 0.15% and 0.60% of the wall height, respectively. These research results can be applied to the construction and design of reinforced soil-retaining walls in high-speed railways. The effects of the elastic modulus of filler, the tensile modulus of reinforcement and the reinforcement length on the characteristics of the retaining wall were analyzed in the numerical simulation with PLAXIS2D. The results and analysis show: the elastic modulus of filler and reinforcement length have a significant effect on the horizontal displacement of the retaining wall. The results of this experiment can be referenced for engineering projects.