14 Plaxis bulletin l Autumn issue 2010 l www.plaxis.

nl
Construction methodology
In order to minimise ground movements adjacent
to deep excavations at sensitive sites it is common
to utilise a top down construction process which
provides a high level of wall restraint during
excavation. Prior to excavation the perimeter wall
is constructed and then progressively propped
by construction of the permanent internal slabs
as excavation progresses. This technique was
proposed at the Victoria site using a perimeter
contiguous piled wall composed of 450 mm
diameter piles at 600 mm centres extending to a
depth of 7 m providing a minimum toe beneath
the deepest section of excavation of 1.05 m
(Figures 3 & 4).
The proposed construction sequence comprised
the installation of permanent slabs at three levels;
ground foor, basement foor and swimming pool
foor, following the sequence below;
1. underpinning of the existing 3rd party
boundary wall (Figure 5)
2. installation of permanent and temporary piles
3. excavation to1m below fnished ground foor
slab level
4. construction of the ground foor slab
5. excavation to 0.2m below the lower ground
foor slab level
6. construction of the lower ground foor slab
7. excavation to 0.2m below the swimming pool
foor slab (maximum excavation depth of
6.25m)
8. construction of the swimming pool foor slab

Construction in city centre locations brings

with it a host of additional challenges for
the geotechnical engineer. Sites are typically
compact with little space for operating plant or
storing materials and surrounding roads are often
congested. In order to maximise developable
space new structures often extend to the edge
of the development site and in close proximity to
existing foundations and services for which little
information is often available. New development
must not only avoid these existing structures but
must also limit ground movements to acceptable
levels to prevent damage.
These various constraints to development are
nowhere more prevalent than in central London.
When a developer decided to construct a new
property with a deep basement on a congested
site in Victoria all of the above constraints were
present (Figures 1 & 2). The site was located to the
rear of Georgian properties dating from the early
part of the 19th Century. The masonry and brick
construction of these properties combined with
their generally shallow foundations made them
particularly sensitive to ground movement and so
it was necessary to develop a robust methodology
for the construction of the new basement.
In order to validate the proposed construction
methodology FE modelling was undertaken using
PLAXIS 2D V9.01 for each construction stage
to confrm foundation movements of existing
properties would be acceptable and to allow
action levels for monitoring to be set.
Excavation of a new 6 m deep basement was required as part of the development of a city centre site in London.
The proposed excavation was within a very congested former car park area and would take place immediately adjacent to a
row of 5 storey Georgian town houses, many of which were founded on shallow strip footings. In order to demonstrate that the
proposed method of basement excavation would have a negligible effect on the existing properties a detailed Finite Element
(FE) analysis of the various stages of basement construction was undertaken. This allowed action levels to be set for monitoring
and provided the necessary assurance to the owners of adjacent properties.
John Rigby-Jones, RJM Ground Solutions Limited, Chris Milne RJM Ground Solutions Limited
PLAXIS analysis of a basement excavation in central London
Figure 1: Congested central London site
Figure 2: Basement excavation was to take place
adjacent to existing Georgian properties
www.plaxis.nl l Autumn issue 2010 l Plaxis bulletin 15
Ground conditions
Available site specifc ground investigation
indicated the site to be underlain by clayey sand
Made Ground overlying the Kempton Park Terrace
Gravels (present as a gravelly sand). London Clay
was present just below the proposed pile toe
level. Groundwater was recorded at the base of
the Terrace Gravels. The soil profle is summarized
below in Table 1. A hydrostatic ground water
Figure 1: Congested central London site
Table 1: Design soil profle
Name
Depth to base of
stratum (mbgl)
Level of base of
stratum (mAOD)
Fill 2 4.2
Terrace Gravels 8 -1.8
London Clay
(assumed in model)
16.2 -10
Ground level = 6.2 mAOD Ground water level = -1.3 mAOD
Parameter Symbol Fill
Terrace
Gravels
London Clay Unit
Material Model Model Mohr-Coulomb Mohr-Coulomb Mohr-Coulomb -
Type of behaviour - Drained Drained Drained* -
Coeffcient of at
rest earth pressure
K
0
0.45 0.37 1.5 -
Unsaturated weight Tunsat 18 21 19.8 kN/m
3
Saturated weight Ysat 20.5 23 19.8 kN/m
3
Permeability x direction k
x
0 0 0 m/d
Permeability y direction k
y
0 0 0 m/d
Stiffness
(moderate strain unloading)
E kN/m
2
Poisson's ratio (unloading) y 0.15 0.15 0.495 -
Cohesion c 0.2# 0.2# 100 kN/m
2
Friction angle z 33 39 0
Dilatancy angle } 3 9 0
Interface strength reduction
Rinter
0.8 0.8 0.7 -
* undrained behaviour of the London Clay to represent ground response to short term excavation has been modelled using an
undrained total stress analysis (ref. Plaxis 2D materials model manual Section 2.7) with the material behaviour set to drained in
conjunction with undrained soil parameters
# a small cohesion applied to avoid complications in obtaining a numerical solution
WC = worst credible
MP=most probable
Table 2: Soil parameters used for analysis
distribution was assumed beneath a level of -1.3
mAOD (below base of excavation at 0.25 mAOD)
based on the results of long term monitoring in a
number of ground water monitoring instruments
at the site. In situ testing was limited to the
undertaking of Standard Penetration Tests (SPTs)
in boreholes with no direct measurement of
soil stiffness undertaken. The shear strength
properties of soils were estimated from
Figure 3: Site layout and cross sections analysed
relationships with design SPT profles, however
this crude process was not considered appropriate
for the estimation of appropriate soil stiffness
parameters. Initial large strain stiffnesses
associated with frst time loading were estimated
using the empirical relationships provided in CIRIA
report R143 (ref 1) for both worst credible (WC)
and most probable (MP) values of SPT N.
These values were then adjusted for the increased
16 Plaxis bulletin l Autumn issue 2010 l www.plaxis.nl
of drained construction stages and as such no
consolidation analysis was required to calculate
intermediate pore water pressures.
The strip foundations of existing properties were
modelled as fully fexible to prevent soil from
hanging up and giving a false reduction in true
settlement. Piles were modelled as plate elements
and foor slabs as fxed end anchors.
Loadings from 3rd party properties were applied
as a combination of foor UDL and wall line
load. The problem geometry was meshed using
15 noded triangular elements with local mesh
refnement to the piled wall (Figure 6).
Three critical cross sections (Figure 3) through the
proposed basement excavation were analyzed
Plaxis Practice: PLAXIS analysis of a basement excavation in central London
using both worst credible (WC) and most probable
(MP) soil stiffnesses in order to determine a
range of likely settlement magnitudes. Ground
movements due to the application of the building
loads associated with existing adjacent properties
were removed from the output due to the age of
the buildings indicating that this settlement would
now be complete.
The deformed mesh is shown in Figure 7 with
vertical settlements shown in Figure 8 and
horizontal displacements in Figure 9. The results
of analysis are summarized below in Table 3.
stiffness associated with unloading behavior
and reduced strain level (0.01-0.1%) following
published guidance (refs 2 & 3) to provide input
values for analysis. The proposed soil stiffness
values were compared to published values for
similar soils at nearby sites in order to confrm their
appropriateness. The input values adopted for
analysis are presented below in Table 2.
Analysis
Analysis was undertaken using PLAXIS 2D V9.01,
modelling soil behavior using the Mohr-Coulomb
failure criterion with granular fll and Terrace
Gravels considered as drained and the underlying
London Clay as undrained (as only the short term
displacements during construction were to be
determined). Analysis was undertaken as a series
Vertical displacements (mm) section 1A Section 4 Section 7
Location WC MP WC MP WC MP
Underside of underpinned
party wall
-3.8 -3.4 -1.8 -1.4 -1.9 -1.4
2m from excavation -3.5 -2.9 -1.5 -1.1 -2.5 -1.6
5m from excavation -2.6 -1.4 -1.2 -0.6 -1.6 -0.8
centre of excavation 9.5 4.9 8.5 4.4 8.4 4.4
Vertical displacements (mm) section 1A Section 4 Section 7
Location WC MP WC MP WC MP
Pile head
(positive = into excavation)
1.4 1.2 0.4 0.36 0.5 0.4
Mid prop
(positive = into excavation)
4.2 3.25 1.8 1.3 1.4 1.3
Table 3: Summary of ground movements
Figure 4: Typical section through basement
Figure 6: FE mesh Figure 5: Underpinning of existing foundations
www.plaxis.nl l Autumn issue 2010 l Plaxis bulletin 17
Figure 9: Horizontal displacements at section 1A stage 7
Figure 8: Vertical displacements at section 1A stage 7
Plaxis Practice: PLAXIS analysis of a basement excavation in central London
Discussion
There are two subtle features of the FE modelling
that are worthy of note. Firstly, the pre-loading
effect of imposing the adjacent building loads
on the sub-soil results in very slightly reduced
settlements beneath the adjacent buildings when
compared to the ground immediately beyond
them.
Secondly, the settlements immediately behind
the wall are slightly reduced due to the combined
effect of a slight unloading due to the excavation
of ground between the piled wall and the 3rd
party wall and the effect of the interface elements
modelling the soil structure interaction between
the piles and the adjacent soil locally increasing
vertical stiffness.
The results of the analyses carried out indicated
that in all cases ground settlements adjacent to
the basement excavation were less than 5 mm.
This confrmation that anticipated settlements
were to be very small provided reassurance to the
adjacent homeowners. Monitoring of structural
movements was undertaken with action levels of
3 mm and 5 mm set corresponding to increased
frequency of monitoring and halt of excavation
works respectively.
Conclusions
PLAXIS analysis provided the necessary
confdence to undertake deep excavation close
to sensitive buildings in a city centre location
and set monitoring action levels. Following the
successful construction of the deep basement at
the study site work has commenced nearby on the
new North Ticket Hall being constructed as part
of improvements to the London Underground
Victoria station.
This excavation is also to be constructed using a
top down technique, however due to the greater
depth and penetration beneath the ground water
table a secant wall is to be constructed which will
toe into the low permeability underlying London
Clay.
The Company
RJM Ground Solutions is a small geotechnical
consultancy specializing in high quality
geotechnical advice and designs servicing a
diverse client base across the UK. www.rjm-
ground.co.uk.
References
CIRIA Report R143 (1995) The standard
penetration test (SPT): methods and use.
CIRIA Report C580 (2003) Embedded
retaining walls.
Atkinson, J.H. (2000) Non linear soil stiffness
in routine design. Geotechnique, vol 50, no 5,
pp487-508.
Plaxis bv (2008) Plaxis 2D Material Models
Manual. Version 9.0.
Figure 7: Deformed mesh at section 1A Stage 7