Behaviour of rigid retaining wall with relief shelves with cohesive backfill

V. B. Chauhan1 and S. M. Dasaka2

1
Research Scholar, Department of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay,
Mumbai 400076, India; email: chauhan.vinaybhushan@gmail.com
2
Associate Professor, Department of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology
Bombay, Mumbai 400076, India; email: dasaka@civil.iitb.ac.in

ABSTRACT
Present study attempts to investigate the possible reasons behind the failure of a cantilever
retaining wall with relief shelves, which is located in the heart of Hyderabad city, India. The
height of the failed retaining wall ranges from 10 to 13.9 m and retains a firm to stiff
cohesive backfill, and constructed with 5 relief shelves. After few years of construction, a
portion of retaining wall of about 20 m length had collapsed and adjoining 20 m length had
severely distressed, immediately after the end of a monsoon. From the preliminary post-
failure investigation, it is noted that quality of concrete used in construction was satisfactory,
and the construction joints were intact. To get more insight about the causes of failure,
numerical analysis of retaining wall with relief shelves is carried out in undrained condition
of saturated cohesive backfill, as the wall had failed just after monsoon. From the preliminary
analysis, it is noted that, though the lateral thrust on the retaining wall in the presence of
relief shelves is reduced up to 38%, use of inappropriate magnitude and distribution of lateral
earth pressure in the design calculations might have attributed to the failure of the wall.
INTRODUCTION
A retaining wall is a structure, which is designed and constructed to resist the lateral pressure
of soil, to support vertical or near vertical backfills. There have been situations where high
retaining walls are required to resist the lateral earth pressure. Reinforced soil walls may be a
possible solution for such cases, but for construction of such walls, a well graded granular
material is preferable due to its higher shear resistance and good soil reinforcement
interaction, where undrained conditions would prevail. So, availability of a suitable backfill
material is a prerequisite for its suitability in reinforced soil wall construction. One alternative
to tackle such issues is to reduce the lateral thrust on the wall, which would obviously reduce
the sectional dimensions of the wall and cost of the project.
A pressure relief shelf is a thin horizontal cantilever platform of finite width, extending into
the backfill at right angles, throughout the length of the retaining wall, constructed
monolithically with the stem of the retaining wall. Number of such shelves is constructed at
regular spacing along the height of the wall.
A few researchers previously proposed this technique with limited theoretical studies but
without systematic analysis and proper validation, and demonstrated that provision of relief
shelves can reduce lateral earth pressure on retaining walls and subsequently increase the
stability of the retaining (Jumikis 1964; Chaudhuri et al. 1973; Banerjee 1977 and Bowles
1997). Chaudhuri et al. (1973) demonstrated the benefit of single relief shelf on the reduction
of total lateral thrust on a cantilever wall, through stability analysis of wedges as well as
small-scale physical model tests. Through small scale model tests, it was showed that wall
with relief shelf can retain larger height of sand just prior to the incipient overturning
compared to wall without relief shelf (Chaudhuri et al. 1973). Through a series of model tests
on instrumented wall, Yoo et al. (2012) and Moon et al. (2013) showed that distribution of
lateral earth pressure on the retaining with relief shelves is a compound function of width and
position of relief shelf on wall. Similarly, through the finding of model tests, it is noted that
when the relief shelf is located below a certain depth, it could not contribute much to the
lateral earth pressure reduction in upper part of wall (Liu et al. 2011). Also some
recommendations were laid for optimum ratio of location to width of relief shelf for possible
distribution of lateral earth pressure on upper part of wall. Analogous to proposed lateral
earth pressure below the relief shelf (Jumikis 1964; Chaudhuri et al. 1973 and Bowles 1997),
zero earth pressure is reported just below the relief shelf from the findings of model study of
pile-supported cantilever retaining wall with single relief shelf (Liu et al. 2013). To study the
effectiveness of various width and location of one/two relief shelves, authors have also
investigated lateral earth pressure on the retaining with relief shelves by conducting a
physical model test in laboratory for 0.6m high instrumented wall with relief shelves (at
different positions with varying width) and noted that provision of relief shelf contributes to
the reduction of earth pressure on the wall and make the design economical (Chauhan and
Dasaka 2016 and Khan et al. 2016).
A case study of failure of a 10-13.9 m high cantilever retaining wall with relief shelves
located in Hyderabad, India, had been reported. The above structure had failed after few
years of construction, and cracks on the stem of retaining wall just below one of the relief
shelves were noted, as shown in Fig. 1. The forensic studies reveal that quality of concrete
used in the wall construction was very satisfactory, and construction defects were completely
ruled out. To get more insight into the causes of failure, Chauhan et al. (2016) conducted

Figure 1. Cantilever retaining wall with relief shelves in Hyderabad, India.

numerical analysis of retaining wall with pressure relief shelves considering cohesionless
backfill. It was reported that larger width of relief shelves, i.e. 2.5 m, used in the above
study, might have significantly increased the stresses in the stem of retaining wall just
below the relief shelves, leading to unanticipated high tensile and compressive stress on the
faces of stem of wall just below one of the relief shelves. These unanticipated stresses
might have been neglected in the designs, resulting in failure/distress of retaining wall. As the
wall had failed just after monsoon, so poor drainage and earth pressure generated due to
saturated backfill may be a probable reason to failure. In order to investigate the possible
reason behind the failure of wall, this study is extended with saturated cohesive backfill
material in undrained analysis.
The present study is aimed at understanding the behaviour of such walls having cohesive
backfill and ascertain the effectiveness of relief shelves to reduce lateral thrust and getting
proper insight into the associated mechanisms involved in the failure of wall.
INVESTIGATION OF FAILURE OF A RIGID RETAINING WALL WITH RELIEF
SHELVES
Failed retaining wall at Hyderabad, India, with relief shelves has been analysed in FLAC 3D.
Sectional dimensions of the wall (Fig. 2b) were obtained from the forensic report available
with the client (Chauhan et al. 2016). As the soil (backfill and foundation) and wall properties
are not available to the authors, so an acceptable range of material properties were taken from
Singh and Babu (2010) and Chauhan et al. (2016) respectively, as shown in Table 1.

Figure 2. Cantilever retaining wall with relief shelves, Hyderabad (a) result of
numerical analysis (b) sectional dimensions (m).
From the numerical analysis, it is found that retaining wall has failed and an attempt is made
to capture the progressive failure of wall to understand the reason behind the inception of
failure. It is found that due to use of high width of relief shelves, third relief shelf from the
backfill surface is severely stressed at the wall and relief shelf junction due to very high
bending stresses at the junction (Fig. 2a), due to which wall portion above to this relief shelf
has displaced significantly compared to lower part of wall stems (Fig. 3a).
Table 1. Material properties (Chauhan et al. 2016 and Singh and Babu 2010)
Property Backfill and Foundation soil Retaining wall
3
Bulk unit weight (kN/m ) 19.0 25.0
2 4
Modulus of elasticity (kN/m ) 3 × 10 2.9 × 107
Poisson’s ratio 0.3 0.15
Friction angle (degrees) 27.5 --
Cohesion (kN/m2) 10 --

Also a sign of succeeding displacement started at the relief shelf next below it. Due to this
wall movement, a subsequent phase of movement in backfill can be observed in Fig. 3b and
3c. Also a stress reversal of generated stresses on faces of wall (contrary to conventional rigid
retaining cantilever walls) is observed near the wall stem junction similar to that observed in
the study of same wall with unsaturated cohesionless backfill (Chauhan et al. 2016). It is
noteworthy that displacement at wall-shelf junction (Fig. 3a) is similar to failure of wall and
crack below one of relief shelf (Fig. 1). These unanticipated stresses might have been ignored
during the design of the retaining wall, which resulted cracking of the stem of retaining wall.

Figure 3. Cantilever retaining wall with relief shelves, Hyderabad (a) displacement of
wall started (b) progressive displacement in backfill system (c) overall failure of wall
system.
MODELLING OF RETAINING WALL WITH RELIEF SHELVES
To provide a possible solution for the failed retaining wall with relief shelves with cohesive
backfill, a cantilever retaining wall having a height of 14.2 m has been chosen for the present
study (Fig. 4). Five cantilever relief shelves of same widths are provided at different heights
of the wall (Chauhan et al. 2016). Cohesive soil has been selected as backfill and foundation
soil (same as shown in Table 1). Width of relief shelf is varied from 0.6 m to 1.5 m to
examine the reduction of lateral earth pressure and total thrust. Length of wall is considered
as 1.0 m for analysis. Conventional retaining wall without relief shelves (Fig. 5a) is hereafter
referred to as RS 0.0. Retaining wall with relief shelves is shown in Fig. 5b, where B
represents width of relief shelf which is varied as 0.6 m, 0.9 m, 1.2 m and 1.5 m, having
thickness of 0.3 m and referred to as RS 0.6, RS 0.9, RS 1.2 and RS 1.5.

Figure 5. Sectional dimensions of retaining wall (a) without relief shelf and (b) with
relief shelves (Chauhan et al. 2016) and (c) numerical grid of rigid retaining wall with
relief shelves (not to scale).
The rigid wall is modelled as elastic material and backfill material is modelled as an elasto-
plastic material following Mohr-Coulomb failure criterion. Material properties considered in
the analysis are shown in Table 1. Fig. 5 shows the numerical grid considered to simulate the
rigid retaining wall having static surcharge of 30 kPa. Fixed boundary condition at bottom of
foundation and roller boundary condition at vertical end of soils are chosen to represent field
conditions. Numerical model described above is validated with the experimental findings of
Ertugrul and Trandafir (2011) and discussed in Chauhan et al. (2016).
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
In the present analysis, rigid retaining walls with five relief shelves provided at different
heights of wall having equal widths are analysed with FLAC3D. The lateral earth pressure
distribution, contact pressure below base slab, total lateral thrust and deflection of relief
shelves are analysed and discussed below.
Contact pressure below base slab
Variation of contact pressure below base slab for all retaining walls considered in the present
study is shown in Fig. 6. Contact pressure is marginally lower in case of walls with shelves.
With increase in width of relief shelf, contact pressure below the base slab has reduced by
maximum 2% only.
 Figure 6. Contact pressure below the base for various retaining walls.
Lateral earth pressure and total thrust on the retaining wall
Distribution of earth pressure on all walls with and without relief shelves have been studied
and shown in Fig. 8. Provision of five relief shelves has divided the whole retaining wall into
six small segments.

Figure 7. Lateral earth pressure on the wall for rigid retaining wall with relief shelves.
Table 2. Total thrust and reduction in thrust on retaining walls
Wall type RS 0.0 RS 0.6 RS 0.9 RS 1.2 RS 1.5
Total thrust (kN/m) 865.0 571.7 563.0 549.97 532.8
% Reduction in thrust ------- 33.9 34.9 36.4 38.4

From Fig. 7, it can be observed that lateral earth pressure (total stress analysis) in top first
segment has not changed with width of relief shelf which is in line with Liu et al. (2011),
which suggests that relief shelf does not much participate in reduction of earth pressure in
upper wall section. In lower portions of wall, earth pressure reduced with increase in width of
relief shelf, which can be attributed to the fact that a great portion of overburden and
surcharge is carried by uppermost relief shelf. Total thrust from above earth pressure
distribution is calculated and shown in Table 2. A noteworthy amount of total thrust
reduction is obtained by provision of relief shelves. A range of 33-38% of total thrust
reduction is achieved by provision of relief shelves having saturated cohesive backfill with
static surcharge of 30kPa.

Lateral displacement of retaining walls and deflection of relief shelves

A typical displacement of wall away from backfill has been shown in Fig. 8. It can be seen
that provision of relief shelves to the wall has marginally reduced the maximum lateral
displacement of the wall from 25.2 mm (wall without relief shelf) to 24.9-24.2 mm (walls
with relief shelf).

Figure 8. Contour of lateral displacement of RS 0.9 and summary of maximum

displacement of rigid retaining wall with relief shelves
With increase in width of relief shelf, maximum displacement of retaining walls has been
reduced, which is due to the reduction of total thrust on wall and increased weight of wall due
to relief shelves.
Maximum deflection of all relief shelves from top to bottom are compared and summarized
in Table 3. The notations S1, S2, S3, S4 and S5 represent the relief shelves from top to
bottom of retaining wall. Deflection of relief shelves from top to bottom of wall has reduced
and found minimum for bottommost relief shelf for all retaining walls with relief shelves.
Deflection of relief shelves has significantly increased where the width of relief shelf is
greater than 1.2 m.
Table 3. Maximum deflection (mm) of relief shelves for various retaining walls
Relief Shelf RS 0.6 RS 0.9 RS 1.2 RS 1.5
S1 1.39 2.10 2.93 3.45
S2 1.17 1.94 2.52 3.26
S3 1.02 1.56 2.23 2.84
S4 0.83 1.31 1.85 2.34
S5 0.78 1.20 1.73 2.02

This observation would restrict maximum width of relief shelves to 1.2 m. Larger widths of
relief shelves lead to excessive deflection due to its own weight, which may further increase
due to creep. Among all the cases of retaining wall with relief shelves, RS 1.2 provides
maximum benefit, without leading to excessive deflection of relief shelves.
CONCLUSIONS
The study involves comprehensive finite difference numerical analysis to examine the
possible reason of failure of retaining wall with relief shelves. It is found that use of larger
width of relief shelves has significantly increased bending stress in relief shelf as well as on
the faces of stem of wall just the relief shelves. This unanticipated stresses might have been
neglected in the designs, resulting in failure/distress of retaining wall. From the present study,
it is noted that this technique of reducing earth pressure on retaining walls may prove
economical. Among all the cases of retaining wall with relief shelves, RS 1.2 proves viable,
without leading to excessive deflection of relief shelves. The following conclusions are
drawn from the present study.
1. Retaining walls with relief shelves can considerably reduce the total thrust on wall with
even cohesive backfill. For the present study under prescribed surcharge, a total reduction
is thrust is noted in range of 33-38%.
2. Among all walls considered in the present study, using relief shelves of width 1.2 m
will be effective without leading to excessive deflection of relief shelves.
3. Deflection of relief shelf is proportional to the width of relief shelf, and it also decreases
from top shelf to bottom shelf for a given retaining wall with relief shelves.
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