Location
Arlington, Virginia
Date
14 Aug 2008, 7:00 pm - 8:30 pm
Abstract
The paper discusses a road rehabilitation project and a sports complex, where the underlying in situ materials were typical African black cotton soils known for their expansive characteristics. Field investigations were undertaken to discern the main causes of the pavement distress and the serious damage to roads and structures encountered at a large sports complex with the support of quantitative data from test pits and with laboratory test results. In addition, available design documents and construction records were reviewed to identify key aspects that may have contributed to the observed excessive cracking of the road pavement and damage to both roads and structures at the sports complex. The results of the investigations indicated that the in situ materials were both potentially highly active. It was concluded that either inadequate precautionary measures were taken against heave during the design phase, an indication of the lack of appreciation of the behavior of expansive clay, or that poor supervision and control during construction and commissioning negated many of the design innovations.
Department(s)
Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering
Meeting Name
6th Conference of the International Conference on Case Histories in Geotechnical Engineering
Publisher
Missouri University of Science and Technology
Document Version
Final Version
Rights
© 2008 Missouri University of Science and Technology, All rights reserved.
Creative Commons Licensing
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Document Type
Article - Conference proceedings
File Type
text
Language
English
Recommended Citation
Mgangira, M. B. and Paige-Green, P., "Evaluation of Damage to a Road and Sports Complex on Expansive Clays" (2008). International Conference on Case Histories in Geotechnical Engineering. 1.
https://scholarsmine.mst.edu/icchge/6icchge/session08b/1
Evaluation of Damage to a Road and Sports Complex on Expansive Clays
Arlington, Virginia
The paper discusses a road rehabilitation project and a sports complex, where the underlying in situ materials were typical African black cotton soils known for their expansive characteristics. Field investigations were undertaken to discern the main causes of the pavement distress and the serious damage to roads and structures encountered at a large sports complex with the support of quantitative data from test pits and with laboratory test results. In addition, available design documents and construction records were reviewed to identify key aspects that may have contributed to the observed excessive cracking of the road pavement and damage to both roads and structures at the sports complex. The results of the investigations indicated that the in situ materials were both potentially highly active. It was concluded that either inadequate precautionary measures were taken against heave during the design phase, an indication of the lack of appreciation of the behavior of expansive clay, or that poor supervision and control during construction and commissioning negated many of the design innovations.
