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Soils and Foundations xxx (2018) xxx–xxx
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Seismic motion response and fragility analyses of cantilever

retaining walls with cohesive backfill
Siavash Zamiran a, Abdolreza Osouli b,⇑
a
Marino Engineering Associates, Inc., 1370 McCausland Ave, St. Louis, MO 63117, USA
b
Department of Civil Engineering, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, 61 Circle Dr., Edwardsville, IL 62026-1800, USA

Received 18 May 2017; received in revised form 14 December 2017; accepted 17 December 2017

Abstract

The seismic motion response of a cantilever retaining wall with cohesive and cohesionless backfill materials was evaluated using fully
dynamic analysis based on finite difference method. The dynamic analysis was validated based on experimental test results and then com-
pared to analytical and empirical correlations based on Newmark sliding block method. Seven different earthquake events and the back-
fills with low to high levels of cohesion were considered. Nonlinear regression analyses were carried out to provide correlations between
free-field peak ground acceleration (PGA) and maximum relative displacement of the retaining wall. These results were compared to
results from empirical and analytical methods. Furthermore, fragility analyses were conducted to determine the probability of damage
to the retaining wall for different free-field PGAs and backfill cohesions. It is demonstrated to what extent a small amount of cohesion in
backfill material can influence displacement of the retaining wall and probability of damage in seismic conditions.
Ó 2018 Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of The Japanese Geotechnical Society.

Keywords: Retaining wall; Dynamic analysis; Fragility analysis; FLAC; Backfill cohesion; Newmark sliding block method

1. Introduction ate maximum retaining wall displacement in seismic condi-

Several retaining wall deformations and failures have
been reported during historical earthquakes (Fang et al.,
2003; Ko et al., 2017; Lai, 1998; Ling et al., 2001;
Shakya, 1987). The most well-known method for predict-
ing the seismic deformation of retaining wall is known as
Newmark sliding block method (Newmark, 1965). The
Newmark sliding block method requires the acceleration
time history of an earthquake in the free-field. However,
as the acceleration time history might not be available for
a practical design, some investigators including Richards
and Elms (1979) developed empirical correlations to evalu-
Peer review under responsibility of The Japanese Geotechnical Society.
⇑ Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: szamiran@meacorporation.com (S. Zamiran),
aosouli@siue.edu (A. Osouli).
tions. The Richards and Elms empirical correlation (R&E)
has been suggested in different design guidelines including
Army Corps (Whitman and Liao, 1985) and AASHTO
LRFD Bridge Design Specifications (AASHTO, 2007). In
a more recent study conducted by Anderson et al. (2008)
and as part of The National Cooperative Highway
Research Program (NCHRP) study, an updated correla-
tion was provided based on various Newmark analyses.
The updated NCHRP equation has been embedded in
the recent guidelines including Caltrans (Ertugrul 2013).
More advanced Newmark based pseudo-static methods
have also been developed to evaluate the sliding deforma-
tion of the retaining walls (e.g., Biondi et al., 2014; Conti
et al., 2013). However, it is noteworthy that the above-
mentioned studies only consider the sliding deformation
of the retaining wall and the rotational and tilting deforma-
tion are neglected. Some investigators including Nadim

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sandf.2018.02.010
0038-0806/Ó 2018 Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of The Japanese Geotechnical Society.

Please cite this article in press as: Zamiran, S., Osouli, A., Seismic motion response and fragility analyses of cantilever retaining walls with cohesive back-
fill, Soils Found. (2018), https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sandf.2018.02.010
2 S. Zamiran, A. Osouli / Soils and Foundations xxx (2018) xxx–xxx
and Whitman (1984), Rafnsson (1991), Prakash et al.
(1995), and Wu and Prakash (2001) adopted analytical
approaches to predict the seismic deformation of the
retaining walls considering tilt and rotation of the retaining
wall. However, due to the complexity of these analytical
procedures, the approaches have not been adopted in
design guidelines for practical purposes.
The deformational behavior of gravity and cantilever
retaining walls in seismic conditions, have been studied
numerically (Agusti and Sitar, 2013; Corigliano et al.,
2011; Green et al., 2008; Green and Ebeling, 2003;
Stamatopoulos et al., 2006; Wilson and Elgamal, 2010;
Wu and Prakash, 2001) and experimentally (Green and
Ebeling 2003; Huang et al., 2009; Nakamura 2006;
Richards et al., 1996; Stamatopoulos et al., 2006; Wilson
and Elgamal 2010, 2015; Zeng and Steedman 2000). The
main scope of most of these studies was evaluating sliding
and rotational displacement of retaining wall systems dur-
ing earthquake events. In a few studies (Agusti and Sitar
2013; Nakamura 2006; Wilson and Elgamal 2010, 2015),
seismic earth pressure and retaining wall motion responses
were also investigated. In addition, Huang et al. (2009) and
Wu and Prakash (2001) proposed a wall displacement cri-
terion for identifying the level of damage for seismic per-
formance of retaining walls.
There are some limitations with these studies. For exam-
ple, most of the mentioned studies focused on retaining
walls with cohesionless backfill materials. A few studies
(Agusti and Sitar 2013; Latifi et al., 2016; Mikola et al.,
2014; Osouli and Zamiran 2017; Wilson and Elgamal
2015; Zamiran and Osouli 2014, 2015) considered backfill
cohesion, however, their main focus was not displacement
behavior of retaining walls. Moreover, specific backfill
cohesion was selected in these studies. Therefore, the effects
of cohesion variation on seismic response of the walls were
not considered. In addition, only limited number of seismic
events and shaking intensities were used in these studies.
There is limited information about the seismic deforma-
tional response of retaining walls with cohesive backfills.
However, field inspections by Kapuskar (2005) show low
to high level of cohesiveness in backfill materials. The study
conducted by Caltrans (Kapuskar 2005) investigated 20
different bridge sites in the State of California. It was found
that in 18 cases, the backfill material of bridge abutments
contains some level of cohesiveness. In 9 cases, backfill
materials with up to 95 kPa cohesion were observed.
The other critical factor is the stochastic nature of earth-
quake and its related damages, which is often characterized
by the probability of occurrence or failures. For example,
fragility analyses have been used to evaluate the probability
of failures of different structures (Baker 2015) and caisson
quay walls (Ichii 2004; Jafarian et al., 2014). However,
there has been a lack of knowledge in determining the fra-
gility functions of cantilever retaining wall structures espe-
cially with cohesive backfills.
In this study, the seismic motion behavior of cantilever
retaining walls with different backfill cohesions will be
Please cite this article in press as: Zamiran, S., Osouli, A., Seismic motion response and fragility analyses of cantilever retaining walls with cohesive back-
fill, Soils Found. (2018), https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sandf.2018.02.010
explored using fully dynamic analysis (FDA). The numer-
ical modeling procedure will be validated based on cen-
trifuge tests conducted by Agusti and Sitar (2013). To
evaluate the performance of the retaining wall, seven differ-
ent input motions with different acceleration intensities will
be considered. The displacements for various free-field
peak ground accelerations (PGA) will be analyzed. Fragi-
lity analyses will be conducted to evaluate the probability
of damage based on different earthquake accelerations.
2. Methodology
A series of FDA analyses based on finite difference
method in FLAC (Itasca 2011) is used to identify the dis-
placement characteristics of the retaining walls. In the first
step, the centrifuge study conducted by Agusti and Sitar
(2013) on retaining walls with cohesive backfill material
was used to verify the numerical modeling methodology
(i.e., Analysis Group A in Table 1). The free-field motion
responses of the backfill and the wall displacement during
FDA were compared with centrifuge results of Agusti
and Sitar (2013).
The validated model was utilized to identify the effect of
0, 10, and 30 kPa cohesion in backfills to cover a common
range of cohesions reported for retaining wall backfills by
Caltrans (Kapuskar 2005). Backfill materials were modeled
in unsaturated conditions. For these scenarios, labeled as
Analysis Group B in Table 1, the Imperial Valley earth-
quake (1979) was introduced to the model as the earth-
quake input motion. The horizontal relative wall
displacement (RWD) time history was monitored at the
top and bottom of the wall. The RWD time history was
determined by subtracting the horizontal ground displace-
ment variation in free-field condition from the horizontal
total wall displacement at the desired location (Green
et al., 2008). The maximum RWD during the earthquake
is recorded and is compared with the results of analytical
solutions including Newmark sliding block method,
R&E, and NCHRP correlations (Anderson et al., 2008;
Newmark, 1965; Richards and Elms, 1979).
In order to evaluate seismic deformation of the retaining
walls based on different input motions, Analysis Group C
shown in Table 1 was conducted. Seven different earth-
quake loadings including Imperial Valley (1979), Loma
Prieta (1989), Chi-Chi (1999), Kobe (1995), Northridge
(1994), Hollister (1961), and Friuli (1976) were considered.
For each event, different input acceleration intensities were
applied to the model to correlate the maximum RWD
based on free-field PGA variations. The Amplification Fac-
tor (AF) was used as a representative of input acceleration
intensity. The AF of 100% shows an earthquake with the
input PGA of 0.25 g. In these series of analyses, backfills
with three different cohesions including 0, 10, and 30 kPa
were considered.
Finally, the motion response from the mentioned seven
different earthquakes with various input acceleration inten-
sities and backfill cohesions were used to evaluate the fail-
 S. Zamiran, A. Osouli / Soils and Foundations xxx (2018) xxx–xxx 3

Table 1
Numerical modeling scenarios conducted in this study.
Analysis Scope Earthquake Backfill Cohesion AF (%)
Group (kPa)
A Centrifuge test simulation Loma Prieta 15 170
Kobe 15 60, 100, 170, 235
B Comparison of FDA with analytical correlations Imperial 0 335
Valley 10 335
30 335
C Evaluating displacement response based on FDA and fragility Imperial 0 60, 100, 170, 235, 270, 310
analysis Valley 10 60, 100, 170, 235, 310, 335
30 60, 100, 170, 235, 270, 310, 335,
370
Loma Prieta 0 60, 100, 170, 235, 270
10 60, 100, 170, 235, 335
30 60, 100, 170, 235, 270, 335, 370
Chi-Chi 0 60, 100, 170, 235, 335
10 60, 100, 170, 235, 335
30 60, 100, 170, 235, 335
Kobe 0 60, 100, 170, 235, 270, 310
10 60, 100, 170, 235, 335
30 60, 100, 170, 235, 270, 335
Northridge 0 60, 100, 170, 235, 270, 310
10 60, 100, 170, 235, 335
30 60, 100, 170, 235, 270, 335, 370
Hollister 0 60, 100, 170, 235, 270, 310
10 60, 100, 170, 235, 335
30 60, 100, 170, 235, 270, 335, 370
Friuli 0 60, 100, 170, 235, 270, 310
10 60, 100, 170, 235, 335
30 60, 100, 170, 235, 270, 335, 370

ure probability of the retaining walls using fragility analy-
sis. The failure criterion for the damage of retaining wall
was selected based on previous literature (Huang et al.,
2009; Wu and Prakash, 2001).
3. Numerical modeling procedure
3.1. Model geometry
For centrifuge test simulations (i.e., Analysis Group A)
of this study, the geometry of the prototype model consid-
ered by Agusti and Sitar (2013) is used. The prototype
model is a 6-m high cantilever retaining wall with the stem
and base thickness of 35 cm. The thickness of the retaining
wall in the Group B and C was reduced slightly to repre-
sent a wall with critical factor of safety (FS) of 1.5 for slid-
ing. Therefore, for these analyses, the retaining wall
geometry with the height of 6 m was used but with the stem
and base thickness of 30 cm (see Fig. 1a). The mesh size of
each finite difference element was considered as 50 cm to
avoid wave distortion in the numerical modeling during
dynamic analyses (Kuhlemeyer and Lysmer, 1973).
3.2. Constitutive model and material properties
3.2.1. Soil
The backfill and foundation materials considered in this
study had dilation angle and tensile strength of zero to
represent the soil used by Agusti and Sitar (2013) (i.e.,
low plasticity lean clay). The unit weight, strength and elas-
tic properties of the soil obtained by Agusti and Sitar
(2013) using laboratory tests were used for Analysis Group
A. Agusti and Sitar (2013) conducted triaxial tests for
determining strength properties and they used shear wave
velocity tests to determine the small strain shear modulus
on the samples of the studied soil. For Analysis Group B
and C, other cohesion values (i.e., 10 kPa and 30 kPa) for
backfill and foundation were also considered according to
observations made by Kapuskar (2005).
It should be noted that the foundation and backfill
assumed to be the same material as in some field experi-
ences backfills are from adjacent borrow pits. In this case,
one might argue that by increasing the cohesion of the soil,
the dynamic thrust of backfill reduces and at the same time
the strength of foundation increases. In order to distinguish
the pure effect of increase in backfill cohesion, a set of pre-
liminary analyses was initially conducted to explore this
effect. It was concluded that in case of having cohesionless
versus cohesive foundation with the same backfill, the max-
imum wall displacements magnitudes would be minimally
affected. The specific trial models were two models with
foundation cohesions of 0 and 30 kPa. For both models
the backfill cohesion was 30 kPa. The trial models were
subjected to Imperial Valley earthquake ground motion
with an input PGA of 0.58 g as shown in Fig. 2a. Based
on the considered trial models, the total retaining wall

Please cite this article in press as: Zamiran, S., Osouli, A., Seismic motion response and fragility analyses of cantilever retaining walls with cohesive back-
fill, Soils Found. (2018), https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sandf.2018.02.010
4 S. Zamiran, A. Osouli / Soils and Foundations xxx (2018) xxx–xxx
!n
displacements at top of the wall are shown in Fig. 2b. It is g
observed that the maximum total wall displacement at the G ¼ Gmax 1
1 Rf  Mod 1 ð1Þ
g1f
top of the wall for the case with cohesionless foundation is
relatively close to the one with cohesive foundation. More-
In this equation named UBCHYST equation, n and Rf
over, in most cases, the backfill material is from the same
are constants and calibration parameters to define the
site that the wall is constructed at. Due to this negligible
shear modulus degradation curve. The Mod1, is a reduc-
effect, for analysis presented in this paper, the foundation
tion factor for first-time or virgin loading. The default val-
and backfill soil assumed to be same material.
ues of n, Rf, and Mod1 are suggested to be 2, 1, and 0.6 to
To represent the hysteretic behavior of soil during the
0.8, respectively by Naesgaard (2011).
earthquake loading, the UBCHYST (Naesgaard 2011),
Cyclic simple shear test models can be simulated in
an elastic perfectly plastic constitutive model with a
FLAC to identify the shear modulus and damping curves
Mohr-Coulomb (MC) yield criterion, was utilized. This
using UBCHYST model. The required model parameters
constitutive model has also been used by Mikola and
include (Rf), n, the reduction factor (Mod1), and MC
Sitar (2015). Based on UBCHYST, the secant shear modu-
strength properties of the soil (i.e., cohesion and internal
lus of a soil element is equal to the initial maximum shear
friction angle, tensile strength), elastic properties, and dila-
modulus times a reduction factor which is the function of
tion angle.
soil stress tensors. As shown in Fig. 3a, the secant shear
Consequently, the shear modulus reduction and damp-
modulus decreases within each loading cycle. In this figure,
ing curves can be compared with empirical correlations,
s is the shear stress of a soil element, cs is the shear strain,
laboratory or field test results to assure that the reduction
Gmax is the peak initial shear modulus, and G is the secant
of shear modulus is reasonable. For this study, the default
shear modulus in a given cyclic loop. According to Fig. 3b,
values of the constants and the reduction factor were cho-
for each loop, the stress ratio (g) can be defined as the ratio
sen for a series of conducted cyclic simple shear tests in
of shear stress to vertical stress (s/rv). Based on Naesgaard
FLAC to identify shear modulus reduction and damping
(2011) and Mikola and Sitar (2015), g1 is the change in
curves for three types of soils with the cohesion of 0, 10,
stress ratio since last reversal (g
gmax), gmax is the max-
and 30 kPa. The cyclic simple shear test was modeled in
imum stress ration at last reversal, and g1f is the change in
FLAC using a single element subjected to cyclic load on
stress ratio to reach failure envelope in direction of loading.
its upper and lower boundaries. The soil parameters for
The secant shear modulus is defined as Eq. (1) (Naesgaard
the UBCHYST model are provided in Table 2. Shear mod-
2011):
ulus reduction and damping curves obtained from cyclic

56 m
(c) zmin
35 m
(a)
Stem N kn
6m
Base ks
S
1.5 m
3m
13 m

(b) (d)
D=0 m force
6m Fsmax (Fnmax)

ks (kn)
1
D=6 m
13 m relative shear (normal)
displacement

100 m Fsmax(Fnmax)

Fig. 1. Details of (a) the retaining wall in this study, (b) the free-field model, (c) soil-wall interaction system, and (d) material behavior of shear (and
normal) springs (figures are not to the scale).

Please cite this article in press as: Zamiran, S., Osouli, A., Seismic motion response and fragility analyses of cantilever retaining walls with cohesive back-
fill, Soils Found. (2018), https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sandf.2018.02.010
 S. Zamiran, A. Osouli / Soils and Foundations xxx (2018) xxx–xxx
0.4 (a)
Aff (g)
0.2
0.0
-0.2
-0.4
Displacement (cm)
20 (b)
10
Total
0
-10
0 5 10 15 20 25
Time (sec)
Fig. 2. Time history of (a) Imperial Valley earthquake with free-field PGA
of 0.58 g, and (b) total displacement at top of the wall for backfill cohesion
of 30 kPa and foundation cohesions of 0 and 30 kPa.
simple shear tests in FLAC are shown in Fig. 4a and b,
respectively. In terms of shear modulus reduction and
damping curves, a close agreement is generally noted
between the results of the cyclic simple shear test conducted
in this study using FLAC and Seed and Idriss (1970) limits
for cohesionless soil and Vucetic and Dobry (1991) results
for cohesive soils. However, for shear strains larger than
0.05%, the damping based on cyclic simple shear tests in
FLAC overestimates the ones obtained from lab tests.
Mikola and Sitar (2015) conducted same numerical proce-
dure to obtain damping curves for UBCHYST model and
observed similar overestimation in large strains. The over-
estimation is likely attributed to the larger width of hys-
teretic loops developed by the UBCHYST constitutive
model (Mikola and Sitar 2015).
The main damping feature of the soil material is consid-
ered by the hysteretic behavior of the UBCHYST constitu-
tive model. However, high-frequency noises cannot be
dissipated by a hysteretic damping model (Han and Hart
2006). Therefore, Rayleigh damping was used to diminish
(a)
Fig. 3. Schematic figure of (a) shear stress degradation during cyclic simple shear loadings and (b) stress ratio (g) in shear stress versus vertical stress plot
(modified after Naesgaard (2011)).
Please cite this article in press as: Zamiran, S., Osouli, A., Seismic motion response and fragility analyses of cantilever retaining walls with cohesive back-
fill, Soils Found. (2018), https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sandf.2018.02.010
5
high-frequency noises during the earthquake loadings. A
low amount of critical damping ratio of 0.2% within the
predominant frequency of the earthquakes is sufficient for
the noise filtering (Agusti and Sitar 2013).
3.2.2. Retaining wall
CFoundation= 0 kPa
An elastic beam was used to model the cantilever retain-
CFoundation= 30 kPa
ing wall. Table 2 shows the material properties of the
retaining wall used in Analysis Group A (centrifuge test
simulation), and Analysis Groups B and C. The material
properties for the wall in Analysis Group A were selected
30 35 based on Agusti and Sitar (2013), in which they used a
laboratory-constructed wall. However, the properties of
the wall used in Analysis Group B and C were based on
Noguchi et al. (2009) to represent a conventional rein-
forced concrete retaining wall in practice.
3.2.3. Soil-wall interaction
The soil-wall interaction was simulated based on shear
and normal springs (see Fig. 1c) representing the behavior
of the sliding and compression/separation between soil and
wall elements, respectively. The yielding criteria of the
shear and normal springs were bilinear and based on MC
strength properties. The moduli of elasticity for shear and
normal springs were defined as shear stiffness (ks) and nor-
mal stiffness (kn), respectively. As shown in Fig. 1c, the
strength properties of shear and normal wall-soil interac-
tion springs were defined as S and N, respectively. The
interaction element behaves linearly according to the stiff-
ness of ks and kn for shear and normal interactions, respec-
tively. However, in a case that an interaction force reaches
to an ultimate capacity according to the MC strength prop-
erties, the interaction spring fails. This behavior is shown in
Fig. 1d for the unit length of an interaction element. In this
figure, the bilinear behavior is shown for both normal and
shear interactions. The normal interaction characteristics
are shown inside parentheses. In the figure, Fmax n and Fmax
s
(b)
Gmax G
f
max
(previous reversal)
1f 1
s v
max
(last reversal)
6 S. Zamiran, A. Osouli / Soils and Foundations xxx (2018) xxx–xxx

Table 2
Soil, retaining wall, and interaction properties for Analysis Groups A, B, and C.
Category Parameter Analysis Group A Analysis Group B & C
Primary parameters of soil Bulk modulus, K (MPa) 76 76
Shear modulus, G (MPa) 38 38
Unit weight, c (KN/m3) 20 20
Internal friction angle, u (°) 30 35
Cohesion, C (kPa) 15 0, 10, 30
Dilation angle, w (°) 0 0
Tensile strength, T (kPa) 0 0
UBCHYST equation constants of soil Coefficient component in UBCHYST equation, n 2 2
Exponential component in UBCHYST equation, Rf 1 1
Reduction factor, Mod1 0.7 0.7
Rayleigh damping parameters of soil Minimum critical damping ratio (%) 0.2 0.2
Predominant frequency (Hz) 2.8 See Table 3
Retaining wall properties Bulk modulus, K (MPa) 43,000 19,400
Shear modulus, G (MPa) 32,000 14,600
Unit weight, c (KN/m3) 31.3 23.5
Soil-wall interaction properties Shear stiffness, ks (MPa) 100 2500
Normal stiffness, kn (MPa) 100 2500
Friction angle, u (°) 10 23.3
Cohesion, C (kPa) 0 0, 7, 20
Dilation angle, w (°) 0 0
Tensile strength, T (kPa) 0 0

are maximum normal and shear forces tolerated by the
interaction element per unit length, respectively.
In the centrifuge simulation modeling (i.e., Analysis
Group A), the shear and normal stiffness, cohesion, and
internal friction angle values for interaction springs were
selected based on Agusti and Sitar (2013). They conducted
back analysis using FLAC to identify the appropriate inter-
action properties which represent the interface characteris-
tics of their experimental models. These values were
assigned to Analysis Group A. However, for the numerical
studies conducted in Analysis Groups B and C, the shear
and normal stiffness were assigned using Eq. (2) (Marino
et al., 2016):
K þ 1:3G
k n ¼ k s ¼ 10
Dzmin
where K is bulk and G is the shear modulus of the adjacent
soil, and Dzmin is the smallest size of the adjacent soil ele-
ment as shown in Fig. 1c. Two-third of cohesion and inter-
nal friction angle of backfill materials was used for strength
properties of interface elements (Zamiran et al., 2016).
Table 2 provides the mentioned stiffness and strength prop-
erties of interface springs for all analyses of this study.
3.3. Dynamic considerations and earthquake loading
To avoid unwanted reflection of waves into the model
from the boundaries, ‘‘free-field” lateral boundaries were
used for the numerical study. The bottom boundary, which
the dynamic input motion is introduced to, should be able
to absorb the reflected waves from the surface. To fulfill
these requirements, a viscous boundary setting named
quiet boundary was utilized. The viscous quiet boundary
at the bottom of the model should have full freedom of
motion to absorb reflected waves. Therefore, the accelera-
tion dynamic loading input which dictates the motion of
nodes at the bottom of the boundary cannot be used
(Mejia and Dawson 2006). The alternative loading scenario
is to apply the shear stress history of the earthquake to the
bottom of the model. The shear stress history of an earth-
quake is determined based on Eq. (3) and is a function of
soil density (q), shear wave velocity of the medium (Cs),
and earthquake horizontal velocity time history (vs).
Although shear stress history was used as the input loading
type at the bottom boundary, the equivalent PGA of the
input load is provided for each case.
ð2Þ
s ¼ 2qC s vs ð3Þ
It is important to note that for numerical simulation of
centrifuge tests, the loading and bottom boundary condi-
tion mentioned above provide a more representative wall
behavior than displacement-controlled loading with a rigid
boundary at the bottom (Ilankatharan and Kutter, 2010).
Furthermore, as the prototype model of the centrifuge test
is simulated in the numerical analysis, the utilized loading
and bottom conditions are more applicable than
displacement-controlled loading with the rigid bottom
boundary.
It is also noteworthy that before calculating shear stress
history using an acceleration input time history, it is neces-
sary that raw earthquake accelerations be baseline cor-
rected and frequency filtered. The baseline correction
should be conducted to assure that integration of accelera-

Please cite this article in press as: Zamiran, S., Osouli, A., Seismic motion response and fragility analyses of cantilever retaining walls with cohesive back-
fill, Soils Found. (2018), https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sandf.2018.02.010
 S. Zamiran, A. Osouli / Soils and Foundations xxx (2018) xxx–xxx 7

1.0 farthest distance from lateral boundaries to avoid turbu-

(a) lences due to the boundary conditions.
0.8
3.4.2. Acceleration
0.6 The free-field PGA of an earthquake represents the
G/Gmax

input motion intensity. Therefore, the free-field model

0.4 shown in Fig. 1b was used to evaluate free-field accelera-
C=30 kPa
C=10 kPa tion time history and free-field PGA. Based on preliminary
0.2 C=0 kPa analyses, the acceleration output from the free-field model
Seed & Idriss Limits still had some noises due to refraction and boundary effects
Vucetic & Dobry Limits
0.0 in contrast to the velocity output (Boore and Bommer,
0.001 0.01 0.1 1 10 2005). The noise level of acceleration time history is espe-
Shear Strain (%)
30
cially high for a more severe input motion with high AF.
(b) Therefore, the velocity time history was used instead of
25 acceleration per Anderson et al. (2008). The velocity time
history of the seismic load was extracted at the top of the
Damping (%)

20
15
10
5 the numerical model for Kobe earthquake with AF of
0 Velocity (PGV), PGAff-d is the direct free-field PGA
0.001 0.01
Shear Strain (%)
Fig. 4. Cyclic simple shear test results for three types of soil used in this
study and the comparison with empirical correlations for (a) shear
degradation curves and (b) damping curves.
tion values through the time reaches to zero (Zamiran
et al., 2012). Moreover, the frequency filtration should be
carried out to cutoff low and high frequency noises
(Douglas and Boore, 2011). The Seismosignal program
was used to conduct baseline correction and frequency fil-
tering (Seismosoft, 2016). For frequency filteration, the fre-
quency contents of input accelerations lower than 0.25 Hz
and higher than 15 Hz were filtered using Seismosignal
(Agusti and Sitar, 2013).
The earthquake events used for different Analysis
Groups of this study are provided in Table 3 with their his-
torical information and motion characteristics. The signif-
icant duration of the earthquake shown in this table is the
time of the earthquake with 5% Arias Intensity (Is) to the
time of the earthquake with 95% of Arias Intensity
(Trifunac and Brady, 1975).
3.4. Free-field analyses
3.4.1. Displacement
In order to evaluate the RWD response of the wall, the
ground displacement, when no wall is present, is needed.
Therefore, a site response analysis was conducted to deter-
mine the ground displacement of the system in the free-field
condition. The geometry of the free-field model in this
study is shown in Fig. 1b. The ground displacements were
extracted at the middle section of the model which has the
free-field model at the surface (see Fig. 1b) and the acceler-
ation time history was obtained by calculating the deriva-
tive of the velocity output and is called modified
acceleration.
As an example, Fig. 5 shows the free-field response of
290%. In this figure, PGVff is the free-field Peak Ground
0.1
obtained from the history monitoring of the acceleration
at the ground surface, and PGAff is the modified free-
field PGA based on the aforementioned methodology here-
after called free-field PGA. As it can be seen in the figure,
direct free-field PGA fluctuates intensely along the surface
of the free-field model. The level of fluctuation is increased
adjacent to the boundary of the model. However, the mod-
ified free-field PGA approximately remains constant along
the model surface. At the middle of the free-field model, the
PGAff-d is about 1.3–2 times of the PGAff showing the level
of the noises in the direct acceleration output. At the
boundary of the model, this ratio increases to 2.3 demon-
strating the severe raise on the noise level due to the bound-
ary condition.
4. Numerical modeling verification
The centrifuge model consisted of a 17-cm high retain-
ing wall representing a prototype wall with a height of 6
m (Agusti and Sitar 2013). The geometry of the prototype
model is shown in Fig. 1a. The results of site response anal-
yses including free-field displacement, velocity, and modi-
fied acceleration for fully dynamic analysis of prototype
model are compared with centrifuge test results in Fig. 6
for Loma Prieta 1989 earthquake. As shown in Fig. 6, a
satisfactory agreement for free-field displacement, velocity,
and accelerations time history is observed between numer-
ical results and centrifuge output at the model surface.
Acceleration and velocity are approximately in the same
phase for both numerical and centrifuge results. Also, the
displacement time histories for FDA and centrifuge analy-
ses have less than one-second phase difference. The differ-
ence between FDA and centrifuge results for the majority

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8 S. Zamiran, A. Osouli / Soils and Foundations xxx (2018) xxx–xxx

of the free-field peak values of acceleration and velocity is
less than 5% except in about four to five peaks where the
difference reaches up to 20%. This can be attributed to
the level of noise in the numerical model and/or inaccuracy
in the data acquisition in the centrifuge tests.
The maximum RWD at the top of the wall was also
reported in Agusti and Sitar (2013) using Kobe input
motion with different AFs. The maximum RWD in various
AFs obtained from numerical and centrifuge tests are
shown in Fig. 7.The results indicate a reasonable agree-
ment between the two methods specifically for all free-
field PGA except between 0.42 and 0.46 g. This can be
due to the inaccuracy of the data acquisition or boundary
condition problems or the higher level of energy damping
in the experimental study compared to numerical simula-
tions for free-field PGAs of 0.42 g and 0.46 g. It is also
observed that the correlation of maximum RWD at the
top and the free-field PGA is nonlinear.
5. Comparison of numerical analysis with analytical and
empirical correlations
5.1. Comparison with Newmark sliding block method
For comparison between the numerical results using
FDA and analytical correlations, Imperial Valley earth-
quake was selected with the AF of 335%. The higher level
of AF was chosen to identify the prediction of each method
in the worst-case scenario with the most severe ground
shaking. In weaker earthquakes, the deformations
obtained from empirical correlations are negligible. The
results of numerical analyses based on Imperial Valley
earthquake with AF of 335% in the cohesionless backfill
are shown in Fig. 8. Fig. 8a shows the free-field accelera-
tion time history recorded in the free-field model during
the earthquake excitation. Fig. 8b shows the total wall dis-
placement at the top and bottom of the stem section as well
as the free-field displacement time history at depths of zero
and 6 m. The RWD at the top and bottom of the stem sec-
tion was calculated based on the mentioned method in Sec-
tion 3, and the results are shown in Fig. 8c. The major
deformation of the system occurred approximately about
the 10th second during the most intense shaking.
For the same acceleration time history in the free-field
model, the estimated wall deformation was computed using
Newmark sliding block method (Newmark 1965). Based on
the Newmark method, the RWD can be calculated by dou-
ble integration of the free-field acceleration values above
the yielding acceleration (ky). The yielding acceleration is
defined as the acceleration which the retaining wall is trig-
gered to experience movement (Newmark 1965). Based on
Richards and Elms (1979), this can be assumed as an accel-

Table 3
Earthquake events and their characteristics used in different Analysis Groups of this study.
Analysis Group A B, C C C A, C C C C
Earthquake Loma Imperial Loma Chi-Chi Kobe Northridge Hollister Friuli
Prieta Valley Prieta
Year 1989 1979 1989 1999 1995 1994 1961 1976
Country USA USA USA Taiwan Japan USA USA Italy
Station SC-1 USGS 5115 CDMG TCU 045 CUE 90 090 CDMG USGS TOLMEZZO
24278 1028 000
Predominant frequency 2.8 7.1 3.3 2.9 3.1 3.8 2.5 3.8
(Hz)
Total time of the event 25.0 39.5 39.9 52.8 40.9 39.9 39.9 36.3
(s)
Significant duration, (s) 12.0 9.1 12.0 13.5 13.2 9.3 17.1 4.1
Arias Intensity, Ia (cm/s) 149.3* 80.6** 60.7** 42.4** 143.7** 46.3** 56.1** 89.1**
*
Arias Intensity is reported for the input motion with AF of 170%.
**
Arias Intensity is reported for the input motion with AF of 100%.

1.5 1.5
A B
PGA
1.2 ff-d 1.2
PGV
PGV (m/sec)
PGA (g)

ff
0.9 0.9

0.6 0.6

0.3 PGA 0.3

ff
A B
0.0 0.0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50
Distance (m)

Fig. 5. Free-field PGA values for direct and modified methodology and free-field PGV, (modified after Osouli and Zamiran (2017)).

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 S. Zamiran, A. Osouli / Soils and Foundations xxx (2018) xxx–xxx 9

mate RWD based on Newmark analysis is approximately

6 (a)
Displacement

50 cm which is nearly 40% and 60% smaller than the max-

3
imum RWD obtained from FDA for top and bottom of
(cm)

0
the stem section, respectively. It is noteworthy that New-
-3
mark sliding block method and empirical correlations
-6
developed based on this method only consider the sliding
40 (b) deformation of the retaining wall and they neglect the rota-
(cm/sec)
Velocity

20
0 0.50 (a) ky=0.18g ky=0.13g
-20 0.25

Aff (g)
-40 0.00
0.4 (c)
-0.25
Acceleration

0.2
-0.50
(g)

Total Displacement (cm)

0.0
-0.2 Centrifuge (b) Wall, Top
100
-0.4 FDA
0 5 10 15 20 25 50 Wall, Bottom
Time (sec)
0
Fig. 6. Ground motion response based on the centrifuge and FDA during Free-field Top & Bottom
Loma Prieta 1989 earthquake with AF = 170% (a) Free-field displace- 150
ment, (b) Free-field velocity, and (c) Free-field acceleration. (c) ky=0.18g
RWD (cm)
100
Max. RWD at Wall Top (cm)

20 FDA 50
Centrifuge
16 0
150
12 (d) ky=0.13g
RWD (cm)

8 100
4
50 FDA, Top NCHRP
FDA, Bottom NCHRPx2
0
Newmark
0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6
0
PGAff (g) 0 10 20 30 40
Time (sec)
Fig. 7. Comparison of maximum RWD at the top of the wall between the
centrifuge test and FDA during Kobe 1995 earthquake. Fig. 8. Motion response of the retaining wall with cohesionless backfill
during Imperial Valley earthquake with free-field PGA of 0.58 g (a) Free-
eration at which the FS against the global stability of the field acceleration, (b) Ground motion and total displacement history at
retaining wall is 1.0 (Richards and Elms 1979). A top and bottom of the wall, (c) Comparison between FDA and empirical
pseudo-static approach can be used to determine the yield correlations with ky of 0.18 g, and (d) Comparison between FDA and
empirical correlations with ky of 0.13 g.
acceleration (Anderson et al., 2008; Masini et al., 2015). In
this study, the FS analysis was performed in FLAC using
strength reduction method per Dawson et al. (1999) and 0.7
Griffiths and Lane (1999). The strength reduction method ky, C=30 kPa=0.65g
0.6
is based on obtaining FS of the system by reducing the
strength of the soil in iterative steps of the analyses until 0.5
the system ‘‘fails”. Fig. 9 shows the results of various
kh (g)

0.4 ky, C=10 kPa=0.39g

pseudo-static trials for evaluating yield acceleration for a
retaining wall with different backfill cohesions. Based on 0.3
this figure, the yield accelerations for a retaining wall with C=30 kPa
0.2 C=10 kPa ky, C=0 kPa=0.18g
backfill cohesions of 0, 10, and 30 kPa are 0.18 g, 0.39 g,
C=0 kPa
and 0.65 g, respectively. 0.1
0.7 0.8 0.9 1.0
Newmark sliding block analysis was conducted for the
FS
free-field acceleration shown in Fig. 8a considering the
yield acceleration of 0.18 g to evaluate the RWD for a wall Fig. 9. Results of pseudo-static analyses to identify yield acceleration for
with zero backfill cohesion. As shown in Fig. 8c, the ulti- retaining walls with different backfill cohesion. *The maximum sliding
RWD drops to zero when yield acceleration is larger than free-field PGA.

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10 S. Zamiran, A. Osouli / Soils and Foundations xxx (2018) xxx–xxx
tional displacement of the wall. However, the RWD at the
top in FDA analysis includes both rotational and sliding
movements of the wall. Hence, according to Green
(2016), it is more appropriate to compare the RWD at wall
bottom in FDA representing sliding deformation with the
Newmark method results. As it can be seen, the Newmark
method underestimates the seismic deformation, particu-
larly the deformations at the top of the retaining wall.
5.2. Comparison with empirical correlations developed based
on Newmark sliding method
There are also empirical correlations such as R&E
(Richards and Elms 1979) and Anderson et al. (2008) that
provide maximum RWD estimation based on Newmark
sliding method using PGA, PGV, and yield acceleration.
It is worth noting that using these methods result in mini-
mal displacements for cases that backfill has cohesiveness;
however, they are commonly used for cohesionless backfill
materials. As shown in Fig. 9, the reason for minimal dis-
placement for the cohesive backfills from these Newmark-
based methods is their large yield acceleration. The large
yield acceleration leads to have limited duration of the
earthquake that acceleration is above the yield and can
contribute in wall sliding per these methods. Similar to
Newmark method, these empirical correlations can evalu-
ate maximum RWD due to sliding. Anderson et al.
(2008) recommended Eq. (4) which is known as NCHRP
equation and Richards and Elms (1979) suggested Eq. (5).
  
ky ky
log ðDr Þ ¼
1:5
0:8 log þ 3:3 log 1

PGA PGA

0:8 log ðPGAÞ þ 1:6 logðPGV Þ
 
4
PGV 2 k y
Dr ¼ 0:087
PGA PGA
where Dr is the maximum RWD due to sliding, and ky is
the yield acceleration. In Eq. (4), the parameters of dis-
placement, velocity, and acceleration should be in inch,
inch/s, and inch/sec2, respectively. In Eq. (5), the parame-
ters of velocity and acceleration should be in a consistent
unit system with the desired displacement unit. It should
be noted that Anderson et al. (2008) suggested that for a
higher confidence level or in a more conservative design,
the resulted displacement from Eq. (4), i.e., NCHRP
approach, can be multiplied by a factor of two.
Fig. 8c shows the predicted maximum RWD due to slid-
ing based on NCHRP approach for yield acceleration of
0.18 g. As can be seen in this figure, the NCHRP’s RWD
prediction for sliding is less than the maximum RWD at
the wall bottom obtained from FDA, which represents
the sliding movement of the wall. There is a close agree-
ment between NCHRP RWD predictions that are factored
by two and FDA results at wall bottom. The larger differ-
ence between NCHRP and FDA results at the top of the
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fill, Soils Found. (2018), https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sandf.2018.02.010
wall might be due to the fact that the rotational displace-
ment of the wall is neglected in NCHRP method.
The prediction of R&E (Richards and Elms 1979) in the
studied case was computed as 196 cm which is much higher
than FDA results at the bottom of the wall, Newmark
results, and NCHRP method. This shows that R&E
method can overestimate the seismic wall displacement
specifically in earthquakes with higher intensities, which
was also noted by Whitman and Liao (1985).
There are some studies that suggest the yield accelera-
tion is determined when FS for global stability is slightly
above one (Green et al., 2008; Green and Ebeling, 2003).
It is noteworthy that Newmark sliding block method and
related empirical methods are very sensitive to the selection
of yielding criterion. Also, the FS may vary depending on
the utilized FS calculation method. For example, Fig. 8d
shows the updated RWDs based on Newmark method
and NCHRP approach considering yield acceleration of
0.13 g which results in the FS of 1.1 in the pseudo-static
analysis. As it can be seen from Fig. 8c and d, the RWD
displacements calculated by Newmark or related empirical
methods are sensitive to calculated yield acceleration.
Regardless of yield acceleration criterion, the mentioned
empirical methods underestimate the RWD predictions at
the top of the wall.
A sensitivity analysis was conducted to demonstrate the
rate of variations of maximum sliding RWD resulting from
different yield accelerations and in various backfill condi-
tions. The results of the sensitivity analysis are shown in
Fig. 10. The maximum RWD at the wall bottom obtained
from FDA are compared to NCHRP and R&E predictions
of maximum RWD due to sliding based on different yield
accelerations. The prediction of the maximum RWD based
ð4Þ on R&E and NCHRP in case of safety factor of one is
shown with circle symbols. As can be seen in Fig. 10c, this
prediction reaches to zero in higher yield accelerations for
ð5Þ both NCHRP and R&E methods. The reason is that the
yield acceleration for a safety factor of one for a model
with 30 kPa backfill cohesion is higher than the free-field
PGA. In such cases, the earthquake acceleration never
reaches to yield acceleration and hence, the displacement
is zero. The same case occurred when yield acceleration
reaches to free-field PGA. In these cases, which is more vis-
ible in Fig. 10b and c, the maximum RWD drops abruptly
to zero.
The variation of predicted displacements based on R&E
method is more sensitive to the changes of yield accelera-
tion in all cases compared to NCHRP. According to
Fig. 10a, for cohesionless backfill material for a yield accel-
eration representing FS of 1.0, NCHRP and R&E methods
provide underestimation and overestimation of maximum
RWD at the wall bottom, respectively. However, in the
cases with backfill cohesion of 10 kPa and 30 kPa for yield
acceleration representing FS of 1.0, both empirical correla-
tions underestimated the maximum RWD compared to
FDA predictions at the wall bottom. The underestimation
for backfill cohesion of 30 kPa is more noticeable than the
 S. Zamiran, A. Osouli / Soils and Foundations xxx (2018) xxx–xxx 11

250 As can be seen in Fig. 11, the displacement outputs for

(a) C=0 kPa
R&E- Sliding different earthquakes in lower free-field PGAs (i.e., less
200
Max. RWD (cm)

NCHRP- Sliding
FDA-Bottom than 0.3 g) are less scattered than higher free-field PGAs.
150 Prediction for FS=1 Moreover, based on the regression trends shown in the fig-
100
ure, it can be concluded that maximum RWD of the cases
with the cohesion of 30 and 10 kPa are nearly 8 and 25 per-
50 * cent of the RWDs for cases with zero cohesion. The dis-
0 placement response of the wall in Chi-Chi earthquake
30 was relatively lower than other earthquakes. The reason
(b) C=10 kPa is that the Arias Intensity of Chi-Chi input motion was
Max. RWD (cm)

the lowest compared to other earthquakes (see Table 3).

20 Moreover, for Chi-Chi earthquake, the accelerations which
are in the range of PGA values occur in short period. How-
10 ever, in other earthquakes studied herein, the high acceler-
* ation occurs in longer periods.
For each retaining wall with certain backfill cohesion,
0
nonlinear regression analysis was conducted to estimate
12 (c) C=30 kPa the correlation between the free-field PGA and maximum
Max. RWD (cm)

RWD. The regression curves for each case with different

9 backfill cohesions are shown in Fig. 11. The resulted equa-
6
*
3 ½% ¼ ð
0:012C þ 0:363Þeð
0:05Cþ6:82ÞPGAff
0 where RWDMax/H is the normalized maximum RWD at
0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6
ky (g)
Fig. 10. Sensitivity analysis of yield acceleration in empirical correlations
of sliding displacement of the wall for Imperial Valley earthquake with AF
of 310% for backfill cohesions of (a) 0 kPa, (b) 10 kPa, and (c) 30 kPa.
*The maximum sliding RWD drops to zero when yield acceleration is
larger than free-field PGA.
case with 10 kPa backfill cohesion. For the backfill with the
higher cohesion of 30 kPa, the yield acceleration is higher.
Therefore, in very limited and shorter periods, the earth-
quake acceleration exceeds the yield limit and causes wall
displacement. This results in negligible wall deformation
and underestimation of sliding maximum RWD.
6. Displacement study based on seven different earthquakes
using FDA
Different earthquakes due to their different characteris-
tics including acceleration fluctuations, Arias Intensity, sig-
nificant duration, and frequency content can influence
motion response of a retaining wall system. To evaluate
the dispersion of motion response of the retaining wall with
different backfill cohesions, the retaining wall models were
subjected to seven different events with various AFs (see
Table 3). The results of numerical analyses conducted
tions for the regression curves are provided in Eq. (6).
RWDMax
ð6Þ
H
0.7
the top in percent, C is the backfill cohesion in kPa, and
PGAff is the free-field PGA in g (gravitational accelera-
tion). According to Fig. 11, the amount of backfill cohesion
can considerably decrease the wall deformation and reduce
the level of damage in moderate to severe earthquakes that
have free-field PGA of more than 0.3 g.
The regression lines shown in Fig. 11 are replotted to
correlate the maximum RWD at the wall top with the
free-field PGA normalized by the yield acceleration of
0.18 g, 0.39 g, and 0.65 g for backfills with cohesion of 0,
10, and 30 kPa (see Fig. 12). The data of maximum
RWD at the wall top for all three backfill types would be
reduced into almost similar trends as shown in Fig. 12.
In this figure, the regression lines show an overlap and sim-
ilar trend for cohesive backfill materials (i.e., cohesion of 10
and 30 kPa) and they are different than the one for cohe-
sionless material. Therefore, as an alternative to Eq. (6),
which is based on cohesion level of the backfill, Eq. (7)
can be developed to correlate the maximum RWD to
PGAff/ky. In this equation, c1 and c2 are the constants
and equal to 0.064 and 3.124, respectively for cohesive
backfills. For cohesionless backfill, c1 and c2 are 0.408
and 1.206, respectively.
RWDMax c2 PGAff

½% ¼ c1 e ky ð7Þ
based on these seismic events with different AFs for backfill H
cohesion of 0, 10, and 30 kPa are shown in Fig. 11. The
results are shown for the free-field PGA range of 0.05 g 7. Fragility analysis
to 0.65 g. As the most significant displacement occurs at
the top of the retaining wall, only the results of the maxi- As discussed in the previous section, the level of uncer-
mum RWD at the wall top are shown. tainty for evaluation of wall deformation during a seismic

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12 S. Zamiran, A. Osouli / Soils and Foundations xxx (2018) xxx–xxx

80 (a) (b) (c) Loma Prieta

C=0 kPa C=10 kPa C=30 kPa Chi-Chi
70
Max. RWD at Wall Top (cm)

Kobe
60 Northridge
Imperial Valley
50 Hollister
40 Friuli

30

20

10

0
0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6
PGAff (g) PGAff (g) PGAff (g)

Fig. 11. Maximum RWD at the top of the wall based on FDA for different free-field PGAs for backfill cohesions of (a) 0 kPa, (b) 10 kPa, and (c) 30 kPa.

choose the appropriate level of damage considering the

Max. RWD at Wall Top (cm)

80 C=0 kPa
C=10 kPa importance of a retaining wall and its adjacent
60 C=30 kPa infrastructure.
The fragility analysis helps to identify the probability of
40 different levels of damage due to an induced earthquake
20
intensity. As mentioned before, the free-field PGA is
selected as the representation of the seismic event intensity.
0 The maximum RWD at the wall top normalized by the wall
0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0 height for free-field PGA values of zero to 0.85 g is deter-
PGAff/ky mined from displacement-acceleration plots shown in
Fig. 12. Maximum RWD at the top of the wall based on FDA versus free-
Fig. 11 for each earthquake. Therefore, for any selected
field PGA normalized by yield acceleration. free-field PGA, seven different normalized displacements
resulted from seven earthquake events were determined.
The normalized displacement variables can be considered
event is high. An effective approach for characterization of as a lognormal distribution data with the probability den-
motion responses with a high level of uncertainty for a sity function (PDF) shown as Eq. (8) (Argyroudis et al.,
retaining wall during seismic condition is to conduct fragi- 2013; Chiou et al., 2011).
lity analysis. The initial step to carry out the fragility anal-
ysis for the seismic response of a structure such as a "  2 #
retaining wall is to define the level of damages in the seis- 1 ln X
kÞ
f X ðX Þ ¼ pffiffiffiffiffiffi exp
0:5 06X <1
mic conditions. Different investigators have suggested crite- 2p1X 1
ria for permissible and seismic failure displacements of
retaining walls. Most of these criteria are based on engi- ð8Þ
neering judgment, historical retaining wall performances where fX(X) is probability density function, X is the ran-
during earthquakes, and experimental studies using shake dom variable of normalized maximum RWD at the wall
table or centrifuge tests (Huang et al., 2009). top, and k and 1 are calculated using Eqs. (9) and (10).
Conservative permissible displacement is considered as
0.02 of the wall height per Wu and Prakash (2001) and k ¼ ln l
0:512 ð9Þ
Huang et al. (2009). The failure displacement can vary "  2 #
from 0.05 to 0.1 of the wall height (Huang et al., 2009; r
1 ¼ ln 1 þ
2
ð10Þ
Wu and Prakash, 2001). Therefore, 0.08 of the wall height l
was considered as failure displacement, and the median of
permissible and failure displacements is assumed as the where l and r are the mean value and standard deviation
moderate level of wall deformation. Consequently, Zone of seven different normalized maximum RWD at the wall
I, II, and III shown in Fig. 13, represent the wall displace- top as a random variable for each free-field PGA data,
ments less than 0.02H, 0.05H, and 0.08H, respectively. respectively. The conditional probability that the normal-
These levels of displacements are interpreted as the level ized maximum RWD at the wall top (i.e. X) is higher than
of minor, moderate, and severe damage. Zone IV repre- the considered normalized displacement or level of damage
sents wall displacements of more than 0.08H and failure. (xi) in a given free-field PGA value is determined using Eq.
It is noteworthy that it is up to a designer’s decision to (11) (Chiou et al., 2011).

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 S. Zamiran, A. Osouli / Soils and Foundations xxx (2018) xxx–xxx 13

Conservative Permissible
Damage Boundaries Moderate displacement Failure displacement
displacement
Wu and Prakash 0.02H 0.1H
Huang et al. 0.02H 0.05H
This Study 0.02H 0.05H 0.08H

Damage zones Minor Zone Failure Zone

Moderate Zone (II) Severe Zone (III)
(I) (IV)

Fig. 13. Criteria for level of damage of retaining walls based on literature and this study.
 
  ln ðxi Þ
k the free-field PGA of 0.75 g and 0.85 g in the case of a
P X > xi jPGAff ¼ 1
; ð11Þ
1 backfill with 10 kPa and 30 kPa cohesion, respectively.
Moreover, for an earthquake with free-field PGA of 0.35
where P is probability, and ; is the cumulative distribution g, which is defined as an earthquake with moderate poten-
function (CDF) of the standard normal distribution of the tial damage (Evans 2003), the probability of moderate
variables. Using Eq. (11), the probability that the normal- damage for walls with backfill cohesion of 0, 10, and 30
ized maximum RWD at the wall top reaches to each level kPa are 30, 0, and 0%, respectively. However, for earth-
of displacement boundaries can be determined as shown quakes with free-field PGA of 0.65 g, defined as earth-
in Fig. 14 for three different backfill cohesions. As noted quakes with high potential of damage (Evans 2003), the
earlier, based on the site circumstances and the acceptable probability of moderate damage for walls with backfill
risk, the design damage zone can be selected in any zones cohesion of 0, 10, and 30 kPa is 100, 65, and 5 percent,
from Zone I to Zone III. respectively. The results in Fig. 14 are based on seven dif-
As can be seen in Fig. 14, the cohesiveness of the backfill ferent earthquakes; therefore, they can provide a better
material has a critical role in motion response of the understanding regarding the behavior of retaining walls
retaining wall. The probability of the failure would in various earthquakes.
decrease with increase in the cohesiveness of the backfill. In addition to normalization of the wall height, the nor-
For example, a retaining wall with the cohesionless backfill malization of free-field PGA by the yield acceleration of
has more than 50% likelihood of failure beyond the free- the cases were also considered. The fragility curves in
field PGA of 0.45 g while this likelihood is excepted at
1.0
(a) (d)
Probability of Damage

C=0 kPa
0.8 C=0 kPa

0.6 I II
I II III III
IV
0.4 IV
0.2

0.0
1.0
(b) (e)
Probability of Damage Probability of Damage

C=10 kPa Maximum PGAff/ky

0.8 C=10 kPa considered in this

0.6 I II III study

I II III
0.4

0.2 IV IV
0.0
1.0 (f)
(c)
C=30 kPa
0.8 C=30 kPa
Permissible Displacement
0.6 Moderate Displacement I I Maximum PGAff/ky
Failure Displacement
0.4 II III considered in this study
II
0.2 III IV

0.0 IV
0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0 3.5
PGAff (g) PGAff/ky

Fig. 14. Results of fragility analyses for a retaining wall with backfill cohesions of (a) 0 kPa, (b) 10 kPa, and (c) 30 kPa versus free-field PGA; and (d) 0
kPa, (e) 10 kPa, and (f) 30 kPa versus normalized free-field PGA by yield accelartion.

Please cite this article in press as: Zamiran, S., Osouli, A., Seismic motion response and fragility analyses of cantilever retaining walls with cohesive back-
fill, Soils Found. (2018), https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sandf.2018.02.010
14 S. Zamiran, A. Osouli / Soils and Foundations xxx (2018) xxx–xxx
respect to the PGAff/ky are shown in Fig. 14d–f for backfill
cohesions of 0, 10, and 30 kPa, respectively. As shown in
the figure, this normalization reduces the data into approx-
imately similar fragility curves for all three cases. It is
worth noting that the PGAff ranges considered in this
study, which covers most common ranges in practice,
would result in maximum PGAff/ky of approximately 2.2
and 1.35 for backfill cohesions of 10 kPa, and 30 kPa,
respectively. However, the general trend of the normalized
fragility curves can be seen in Fig. 14d, which is for cohe-
sionless backfill. The fragility curves in normalized format
(i.e., Fig. 14d–f) is useful tool for determining the probabil-
ity of damage to backfills with other cohesion values that
were not used in this study.
Moreover, as the failure criterion selected for this study
was based on the normalized displacement of the wall
regarding the wall height, the provided results would be
extendable to retaining walls with other heights. This
extension is also reliable for the results obtained from
Eq. (6). Extending the normalized results to other heights
for different cantilever retaining walls is based on the fact
that the backfill of the retaining wall acts as a rigid body
during an earthquake excitation (Anderson et al., 2008).
However, according to Anderson et al. (2008), the rigid
body assumption is only reliable for retaining walls up to
the approximate height of 9 m (30 ft). For the retaining
walls with higher heights, this assumption might not be
valid.
8. Conclusion
In this study, the seismic, horizontal displacement of a
cantilever retaining wall was evaluated using fully dynamic
analysis. Seven different earthquake events with different
free-field peak ground accelerations (PGAs) and three
backfill cohesions of 0, 10, and 30 kPa were considered.
A deformation prediction model based on the earthquake
input acceleration and backfill cohesions was presented.
A fragility analysis was performed to determine the proba-
bility of damage to a retaining wall based on various free-
field PGA levels for different backfill cohesions.
In comparison to FDA method, the empirical correla-
tions underestimate the maximum RWD because they
neglect rotation of the wall. Based on the regression analy-
sis, the maximum RWD for models with backfill cohesions
of 30 and 10 kPa were approximately 8 and 25 percent of
the RWDs for cohesionless backfill, respectively. The
results of numerical modeling and fragility analyses
showed that with an increase in backfill cohesion, the
deformation of the wall reduces and hence, the probability
of failure of wall decreases. The failure displacement never
occurred for backfill cohesion of 30 kPa up to the free-field
PGA of 0.85 g. However, with a probability of 50% the
wall will experience failure displacement when the free-
field PGA reaches to 0.47 g and 0.75 g for backfill cohe-
sions of 0 and 10 kPa, respectively. Presented fragility
curves can be a very helpful tool for designers to examine
Please cite this article in press as: Zamiran, S., Osouli, A., Seismic motion response and fragility analyses of cantilever retaining walls with cohesive back-
fill, Soils Found. (2018), https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sandf.2018.02.010
the probability of damage levels for their designed retain-
ing wall based on their design earthquake acceleration
and acceptable risk. According to the assumption that
the backfill acts as a rigid system during the earthquake,
the results of the study can be used for retaining walls up
to the approximate height of 9 m.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to acknowledge the Itasca Con-
sulting Group, Inc. for providing the license of FLAC
based on Itasca Education Partnership program and Dr.
Zorica Radaković-Guzina from Itasca Consulting Group
for her technical supports. Also, authors would like to
appreciate Dr. Russell Green from Virginia Polytechnics
Institute and State University, Dr. Abouzar Sadrekarimi
from University of Western Ontario, Dr. Prabir Kolay
and Dr. Sanjeev Kumar from Southern Illinois University
and Dr. Shamsher Prakash from University of Missouri
Science and Technology for providing technical supports.
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