Abstract
When a structure with spread footing is built on soft ground, the ground under the structure deforms, and the relative settlement accompanied with the deflection of the foundation occurs. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the factors related to the rate of relative settlement. Numerical results of finite element method with an elastic/visco-plastic model as a constitutive law and measured values of settlements of an existing structure are used in searching the factors influencing the relative settlement. It was found that countermeasures of increasing the permeability in the horizontal direction of the ground under the structure significantly reduce convergence time of the relative settlement.
