Use of reinforced soil foundation (RSF) to support shallow foundation : technical summary report, November 2008.

04-2GT
The presence of a weak soil supporting structural foundations results in low load bearing capacity and
excessive settlements, which can cause structural damage, reduction in durability, and/or deterioration in
performance level. Conventional treatment methods replace part of the weak cohesive soil with an
adequately thick layer of stronger granular fill, increase the dimensions of the footing, or combine both
methods. However, an alternative and more economical solution uses geosynthetics to reinforce soils, which
can be done by either reinforcing cohesive soil directly or replacing poor soils with stronger granular fill in
combination with the inclusion of geosynthetics. The resulting composite zone (reinforced soil mass) will
improve the load carrying capacity of the footing and provide better pressure distribution on top of
underlying weak soils, reducing associated settlements.
Benefits of including reinforcements within soil mass to increase the bearing capacity and reduce the
settlement of soil foundation have been widely recognized. Many hypotheses have been postulated about the
failure mode of reinforced soil foundation (RSF). However, the failure mechanism of reinforcement is still
not fully understood in RSF as compared to other reinforced soil applications. Therefore, it is important to
investigate the reinforcement mechanism of reinforcing soils for foundation applications.