Stone columns for treatment of soft ground

Abstract

Soft ground conditions is one of the significant causes of construction failure. Soft ground generally describes grounds composed of cohesive soil such as clay, highly organic soil, or loose sand deposits. Infrastructure founded on soft ground may experience different modes of failure. Nowadays engineers and scientists are working on the researches on different soil improvement techniques to remedy the ground conditions. Stone column is one of the soil improvement techniques well applied and developed in different countries. In Hong Kong, stone column is yet to be a prevailing engineering technique for ground improvement. This technique can only be found in limited projects, for example, San Tin Drainage Project, and Hong Kong Boundary Crossing Facilities. Due to limited land supply in Hong Kong, reclamation or development on soft ground could be considered a way-out in the future. Rather than traditional piling method, stone column can provide an efficient, economic and environmental-friendly solution for the ground problems.