Structures such as a road constructed on peat continue to settle in many years and often produce serious differential settlements.
The mechanical properties of peat have been studied by many researchers, and the secondary compression is known to be predominant in the settlement. The prediction of settlement at the field based on the Terzaghi's consolidation theory has not been successful yet in many cases for peat.
This paper describes an experimental study to find out a more accurate method for predicting the field settlement. The results show that the consolidation settlement should be interpreted by strain, and the strain increase at the field seems proportional to the value determined in the laboratory by adopting the square law of the depth of the soil layer. Also the long-term settlement appears to be estimated from the laboratory test results by using the concept of Bjerrum.
