Some experiences from full-scale test embankments founded on floating lime-cement columns

In western part of Sweden 80 km of a new motorway and a new high speed railway will be constructed on soft, high-plastic clay. In order to reduce the settlements and improve the stability conditions of the embankments, lime-cement columns will be used extensively, i.e. some 9 million linear metres of columns will be installed. Already during the feasibility studies, in year 2000, a large amount of test-columns were installed in order to study their geo mechanical properties (strength, stiffness, permeability). Furthermore 3 full-scale test embankments, founded on lime-cement columns not reaching firm bottom were constructed in year 2001. The test embankments were considered necessary due to lack of reliable design methods for estimating consolidation settlements of embankments founded on floating columns. The embankments were heavily instrumented in order to study the settlements of the embankments