WATER AND FROST - STABILITY RISKS FOR EMBANKMENTS OF FINE-GRAINED SOILS

In Sweden road construction takes place mainly during the winter in order to maintain even employment throughout the year. This must be taken into consideration in evaluating the stability of embankments built with fine grained soil. When the embankment is more or less frozen during constructin, improper compaction will result. Such an embankment may be stable because of capillary forces as long as it is not oversaturated. However, if it becomes saturated, failure may occur due to gravity force or dynamic influence. It is also important to provide for adequate drainage so that water will not be trapped inside the embankment. The importance of these factors is stressed and details are given of some cases where failures have occurred due to liquefaction, oversaturation at thawing or trapped water. For the covering abstract of the symposium see IRRD 286603. (TRRL)