Investigation of Effective Parameters on the Settlement and Lateral Spreading of Shallow Foundations on the Sloping Liquefiable Soil

The settlement and lateral spreading of the building due to the occurrence of liquefaction phenomenon in previous earthquakes have caused significant damage to structures and their infrastructure. Numerous studies have been performed to evaluate the settlement of shallow foundations located on the liquefiable soils as a horizontal model. In fact, in most cases, there is a mild slope in the layers that can affect the settlement and lateral spreading of the foundation. In this research, the displacements of the structure and shallow foundation/ground surface on the sloping liquefiable three-layers soil with different relative densities have been investigated parametrically, applying three-dimensional finite element (FE) simulations using OpenseesSP. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of parameters including the slope of soil layers, the density of liquefiable layer, groundwater level, foundation contact pressure, and length to width ratio of the foundation on the settlement and lateral spreading of the liquefiable sloping model. The results are shown that increasing the slope of the ground increases the difference between the settlement of the two sides of the foundation and increases the lateral displacements. Decreasing the relative density of the liquefiable layer increases the excess pore water pressure and the settlement of the shallow foundations. The results also are shown that the lower the groundwater level is increased the effective stress and reduces the vertical and horizontal displacements. Besides, increasing the contact pressure is amplified by the foundation of static and dynamic volumetric strains and increases the settlements.