Numerical Modeling of Interrelationships between Linear Transportation Infrastructures and Hydro-Geological Hazard in Floodplains

The development and efficiency of transportation infrastructures has always been a central element in the planning and management of territory, not only with regard to the social and economic aspects but also for the management of environmental emergencies, in particular those of Civil Protection. In the valleys most usual design solution is the road embankment. In the presence of a surface water table the realization of a road embankment causes more or less marked alterations of the piezometric levels, with serious problems to vehicular traffic. Typically in such situations to avoid the risk of flooding of the roadway engineers tend to increase the height of the embankment, thus increasing the overload in the foundation soil and thereby creating new risk situations. In this paper it is proposed a modeling study aimed at determining the interactions between the geometric and geomechanical properties of foundation--road body--roadway and deep and surface water table levels, in order to identify risk scenarios. The numerical analysis has been carried out by a finite element calculation code taking into account different combinations of water level depth and embankment height for different lithological and geotechnical properties of the foundation soils. The obtained results show that there are some critical combinations of the above parameters that can cause the rise of the water level well above the ground surface not only at the road embankment but also in the surrounding areas up to tens of meters from the road. © Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2015.