Ground improvement using geocells to enhance trafficability in desert soils

Massive investments are going on to promote and build transportation infrastructure all across the globe with the challenges being more than budgetary. Sandy soils which are predominant in coastal and border areas in India have typical characteristics. The shear strength of such soil is very low which makes it difficult for any kind of geotechnical construction and hence soil stabilization needs to be carried out for such soil conditions. The use of geocells is one of the most economical methods of soil improvement which is used to increase strength and stiffness and reduce the liquefaction potential of the soil. The use of geocells in stabilizing desert sand and results from a series of plate load test on unreinforced soil and geocell reinforced homogenous sand beds are presented in the present study. It also compares the field results using various load class vehicles like heavy load military vehicles on geocell reinforced soils with the experimental results and comes out with the fact that the proposed technique increases the strength and stiffness of sandy soil considerably and provides a solution for preventing settlement and subsidence.