Piles supporting bridge abutments on soft clay may be loaded laterally
from horizontal soil movements generated by the approach embankment.
The design of piles loaded by lateral soil movements is problematic in
that existing design approaches are generally inconsistent or show po
or correlation with available data. New empirical design charts are pr
esented to allow an assessment of maximum pile bending moment and pile
head deflection based on the relative soil-pile stiffness and current
loading level. A new analytical approach is also developed on the bas
is of a simple deformation mechanism. The method accounts for the main
features of the problem through an approximate representation of the
embankment-soil-pile interaction, and is shown to compare favourably w
ith centrifuge model test data. Recommendations for the design of pile
groups for loading from lateral soil movements are also given.