Abstract—The primary application of various geotechnical
construction techniques is for ground improvement. Many soil
improvement methods have been developed due to the ongoing
increase in urban and industrial growth and the need for
greater access to lands. Stone columns are one of the best
available techniques for soft clay soil improvement. In this
method, subsurface soils which are weak and unstable are
replaced with compacted dense aggregate columns that often
entirely penetrate into the weak layers. This paper aims to
present a short state-of-the art on the stone column ground
improvement technique based on existing literature and
standards. Due to high permeability of the material component
used in the stone columns, not only the load carrying capacity of
the soil is raised, but also the soil settlement is reduced
considerably and the post construction settlement is minimized.
To achieve this goal, several significant characteristics of stone
column in terms of design parameters are considered. One
example of the behavior assessment of reinforced soil using
stone column is included. A new one-dimensional analysis has
been studied in addition to a simplified nonlinear finite element
method. The results indicate that the new method is reliable. It
is also indicated that the settlement of the soil without stone
columns is significantly higher than the similar soil reinforced
with stone column.
Index Terms—Ground improvement, one-dimensional
analysis, settlement, simplified finite element, stone column, soft
clay.
A. Vahedian and S. A. Aghdaei were with University of Wollongong,
Wollongong, NSW, Australia (e-mail: av325@uowmail.edu.au,
saa832@uowmail.edu.au).
S. Mahini is with University of New England, NSW, Australia. He is now
with the Discipline of Civil & Environmental Engineering, University of
New England, Armidale, NSW, Australia (e-mail: Smahini@une.edu.au).
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Cite: A. Vahedian, S. Mahini, and S. A. Aghdaei, "A Short State-of-the-Art Review on Construction and
Settlement of Soft Clay Soil Reinforced with Stone
Column," International Journal of Engineering and Technology vol. 6, no. 5, pp. 420-426, 2014.