SOIL MECHANICS PRINCIPLES FOR HIGHWAY ENGINEERING IN ARID REGIONS

Highway construction is commonly required in arid regions. Soils in these regions are generally unsaturated and are characterized by highly negative pore-water pressures. An extension of saturated soil mechanics principles is required to fully understand their behavior and to perform the necessary analyses for engineering purposes. In recent years there has been a rapid increase in understanding of the behavior of unsaturated soils. Conventional equations for shear strength, volume change, and seepage have been extended to embrace unsaturated soils. Presented in this paper is a summary of unsaturated soil principles and theories particularly relevant to highway design in arid regions. The application of these theories to highway engineering is outlined. In addition, several techniques commonly used to measure soil suction or negative pore-water pressure are discussed. The measurement of soil suction is central to applying unsaturated soil theories.

[1]  Delwyn G. Fredlund,et al.  The Prediction of Total Heave , 1980 .

[2]  D G Fredlund,et al.  SOIL MECHANICS PRINCIPLES THAT EMBRACE UNSATURATED SOILS. PROCEEDINGS OF THE ELEVENTH INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON SOIL MECHANICS AND FOUNDATION ENGINEERING, SAN FRANCISCO, 12-16 AUGUST 1985 , 1985 .

[3]  Delwyn G. Fredlund,et al.  Second Canadian Geotechnical Colloquium: Appropriate concepts and technology for unsaturated soils , 1979 .

[4]  Robert L. Lytton,et al.  MATRIX SUCTION INSTRUMENTATION OF A VERTICAL MOISTURE BARRIER , 1983 .

[5]  D. Fredlund,et al.  The shear strength of unsaturated soils , 1978 .

[6]  D. Fredlund,et al.  STRESS STATE VARIABLES FOR UNSATURATED SOILS , 1977 .

[7]  J. D. Coleman,et al.  PORE PRESSURE AND SUCTION IN SOIL , 1961 .

[8]  Dg Fredlund,et al.  Measurement of Soil Suction Using the MCS 6000 Sensor , 1984 .

[9]  Tuncer B. Edil,et al.  SOIL-WATER POTENTIAL AND RESILIENT BEHAVIOR OF SUBGRADE SOILS , 1979 .

[10]  A. T. Bergan,et al.  Deformation Characterization of Subgrade Soils for Highways and Runways in Northern Environments , 1975 .

[11]  R. J. Hanks,et al.  EVALUATION OF THE FILTER PAPER METHOD FOR ESTIMATING SOIL WATER POTENTIAL , 1974 .

[12]  I. S. Mcqueen,et al.  CALIBRATION AND EVALUATION OF A WIDE‐RANGE GRAVIMETRIC METHOD FOR MEASURING MOISTURE STRESS , 1968 .

[13]  A T Bergan,et al.  RELATION BETWEEN RESILIENT MODULUS AND STRESS CONDITIONS FOR COHESIVE SUBGRADE SOILS , 1977 .

[14]  Delwyn G. Fredlund,et al.  ON TOTAL, MATRIC AND OSMOTIC SUCTION , 1972 .