EXTENDED ABSTRACT TEMPLATE

Title
The Empirical Prediction of The Critical Area of Road Embankment Landslide Using
Limit Equilibrium Method

Putu Tantri K.Sari, Yudhi Lastiasih (initials then surnames, separated by commas)

Civil Engineering Department, Institute Technology of Sepuluh Nopember Surabaya,

60111, Indonesia
Summary:
This study describes the empirical prediction of critical area for road embankment
landslide. Limit equilibrium method used to obtain the value of safety factor, circular
center, resistance moment and other landslide variables. The variables use in this study
are the soil subgrade typical and embankment dimension. The results obtained from this
study are that the safety factor is not the only determinant of the amount of embankment
reinforcement needs. Another variable that is the centre of landslide and delta moment
resistance is also very decisive. The smallest safety factor does not necessarily result in
the number of critical reinforcement requirements of landslide reinforce. In addition,
the landslide area which produces the largest amount of reinforcing needs is different
for each variable used in this study. Empirical formulations were generated in this study
to carry out reinforcement of road embankments to provide safety from landslides.

Keywords: (Landslide, limit equilibrium method, road embankment)

Introduction
Slope instability is one of the main problems faced the manmade road embankment
design. Slope stability analysis is a very important issue in the civil engineering
specially in the geotechnical. It has attracted extensive attention for civil engineering
and geology. The researches have been conducted on sliding surface searching
technology in slope stability analyses since the 1970s [Fang et al (2007),Yao et al
(2008)]. The limit equilibrium method (LEM) is one very common method to analyses
the stability of slopes. This method is used to analyses the slope stability with various
slope dimensions and engineering geological conditions in the field [Ni (2004),Shi et al
(2013)]. Two steps are considered to analyses the slope stability using this method. The
first step is the position of the slope’s potential sliding surface and the second step is
the slope stability analyses of this surface.
To obtain the values of the safety factor (SF) and other variables of slope stability (such
us resistance moment, radius of landslide etc), some formulas in the LEM have been
developed in the most recent research. In addition, many formulations have been
developed to obtain the critical slip surface of the landslide on the embankment. The
critical slip surface calculation is performed to determine the area of landslides on
embankment to carry out the reinforcement design. Generally, the smallest SF values
provide a standard for calculating the reinforcement requirements. In fact, the smallest
value of the SF does not necessarily produce the greatest number of reinforcement needs
[Low et al (1998), Sari et al (2018)]. In addition, areas of landslides that occur in the
field could not be ascertained. In some cases, a landslide area with a SF value below
one (SF<1) is found in most of the landslide trials (Figure 1). Thus, designers will have
difficulty to determine which landslide area is the most critical and deserves to be a
determinant of the calculation of the need for reinforcement. The uncertainty of the
landslides that occur in this field certainly makes it difficult for construction designers
to determine the best reinforcement to ensure the safety of the embankment in relation
to sliding.

Figure 1. Landslide area with a SF value below one (SF<1).

In the process of stability analysis for road embankment, construction designers do not
yet know a definite location where the critical slip surface may occur in the field. In
fact, an analysis of the critical slip surface will be used by designers to determine the
embankment reinforcements if necessary. Hence, the designers assign the landslide
location by trial of a slip surface that is considered to occur in the field. Moreover, there
are many methods of calculating the embankment stability as a standard for
reinforcement design, but the most commonly used and accurate method is the limit
equilibrium. However, the use of this method becomes very "uncertain" because
designers need to carry out the determination of slip surface that is considered possible
in the field.
To find accuracy of slip surface in the field, the designer conducts the trial by several
times. The more trials it takes to get the critical landslide approach, the more accurate
the result, but it is time consuming. Furthermore, as a standard of embankment
reinforcement design, the designer often looks for the smallest SF value of a field trial
of landslides. However, according to [Low et al (1998), Sari et al (2018)], landslides
are not necessarily possible in the field at the minimum SF. Thus, the smallest SF value
is not necessarily the critical condition in the field. To reduce the duration of the stability
analysis, designers generally conduct only an approximately 1-10 trials to obtain 1-10
landslide fields and SF values. However, these values do not necessarily represent the
most critical condition in a field that requires the amount of reinforcement in critical
condition. A design with a minimum number of trials leads to an incorrect amount of
embankment reinforcement requirements. Those inaccuracies in the calculation design
are likely to be one of the causes of the occurrence of landslide in a reinforced
embankment. Research on the amount of geotextile reinforcement needs on the
embankment that produced the suggested graph has been done by [Sari et al (2016)],
but the number of landslide trials was conducted with a very minimal number. Research
that produces the empirical formula to obtain the landslide field that produces the largest
amount of embankment reinforcement done by the [Sari et al (2018) ]. However, this
research has only been carried out on relatively steep embankments (slope 1:1.5) and
has not considered the sloping slope (slope 1:2 and 1:3) which is generally found in
field. Thus, it is necessary to carry out further study to obtain the proposed solutions to
reduce the problems and difficulties experienced by designers.
The main purpose of this study is to develop an empirical formulation to find the critical
surface area of the landslide for reinforcement design which is appropriate under the
various conditions of the embankment and soil subgrade in the field. in addition, this
research is also a continuation of the research study was previously conducted by [Sari
et al (2018)]. A comparison between the area of critical landslides between
embankments with upright slope and sloping slope was also carried out in this study.
The results obtained are expected to find the landslide pattern that occurs on the various
slope and the different soil subgrade conditions so that it can be a reference for the
planner in doing the reinforcement design on landslide of embankment construction.

Material and Methods

This research was conducted soil subgrade data variation and variation of landslide area
using trials. Limit equilibrium (Bishop) is the basic method used for calculations in this
study. The stages of analysis in this research are as follows:
a. Determination soil subgrade data variation and embankment dimension based on
field condition.
b. Determination of a slope stability analysis; 180 landslide trials were conducted for
each variation.
c. Calculation of the amount of reinforcement requirements for all results and
determine the critical landslide area that requiring the greatest amount of
reinforcement.
d. Determining the relationship between the SF value and the amount of geotextile
needs and the relationship between the SF and the sliding moment, circular centre,
and sliding area.
e. Determination of the empirical formula for obtaining the critical landslide area
under some conditions that may occur in the field

Results and Conclusions

The main results obtained after analysis of the variations considered in this research are:
a. The lowest SF value does not necessarily result in the largest number of
reinforcement requirements (Figure 2). Moreover, the largest delta moment
resistance value does not necessarily produce the largest amount of reinforcement
needs (Figure 3).

Fig.2. The number of reinforcements using geotextile and safety factor result based on embankment
dimension variation in soil type 1.

Fig.3. Delta moment resistance and safety factor result based on embankment dimension variation in
soil type 1.
b. Soft soil depth and embankment dimensions are very important in determining the
stability of the embankment and determine the amount of reinforcement needs to
withstand landslides. Dimensions of embankment and compressible soil depth will
also affect the location of the circle center of the landslide and the landslide area
which results in the highest number of reinforcements needs.
c. The more the embankment slope, the greater the distance of the circular centre of
the slope from the subgrade elevation. The more embankment slope, the greater the
distance of the landslide circular center from the embankment toe. The more the
embankment slope, the farther the distance of the beginning of landslide area from
the embankment toe. The more the embankment slope, the closer the distance of the
end of landslide area from the embankment toe. Those result are explained using an
empirical formulation resulted in this research (Tabel 1).
Table 1.1 Empirical formulation of landslide area for embankment slope 1:1.5.
Soil type Distance from embankment toe – Distance from embankment toe –
left side right side
Type 1 y=-2x+30 y=2.01x+13.18
Type 2 y=3.78x-12.46 y=5.14x-7.73
Type 3 y=2.22x-7.32 y=7.86x-30.92
Type 4 - -
Type 5 y=-1.77x+25.06 y=5.48x-12.35
x = height of embankment; y = distance from embankment toe – left side; y = Distance from embankment
toe – right side
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