Short Courses
Saturday, February 20
8:30 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.
All Short Courses are $295 and include morning and afternoon breaks and lunch.
*Note: Due to low registration, Short Courses #2, 3, 6, & 7 were canceled. You may select from one of the four remaining Short Courses and register either online or onsite.
#1 DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION OF STATE-OF-THE-ART
GEOSYNTHETICALLY-CONFINED SOIL WALLS AND ABUTMENTS
Michael Adams
FHWA Turner Fairbank Highway Research Center
Robert Barrett
TerraTask, LLC
Blaise Fitzpatrick, P.E.
Fitzpatrick Engineering Associates
This course presents a summary of 40 years of geotechnical research in retaining walls, bridge abutments, open bottom box culverts, reinforced soils, landslides and rock fall. This research was performed by Colorado DOT, the U.S. Forest Service, the Federal Highway Administration and several agencies and universities. Expenditures on this research effort exceeded 25 million dollars. This research concluded that smaller, lighter inclusions in granular soil produce stronger composite behavior than do heavier, stiffer elements on wider spacing. Full scale demonstrations show that variations in spacing of the inclusions approaches exponentialfactors in some cases.
This course includes analytical methods for designing state of the art geocomposites. Examples of field constructions and including cost estimating will be presented. Key quality control measures will also
be discussed. There will be discussion on deficiencies in current MSE design including reasons for the failure rate in these constructions. Several new tools, methods and techniques will be presented that
are not as yet in standard practice. Earthquake Wings (a new and better way to build abutments in seismic regions) will be presented. The presentation concludes with recent constructions with the Soil
Nail Launcher, including Launched Nails and Launched Micropiles forfoundations and for repair of walls and abutments.
#4 FINITE ELEMENTS IN GEOTECHNICAL ENGINEERING
D.V. Griffiths, Ph.D., D.Sc., P.E.,F.ASCE
Colorado School of Mines
Based on the successful textbook co-authored by the instructor (“Programming the finite element
method” by I.M. Smith and D.V. Griffiths, 4th ed., Wiley, 2004), the course will introduce
participants to a powerful suite of finite element programs relating to practical geotechnical engineering
applications. The course will remove some of the mystique of “blackbox” proprietary geotechnical software by giving attendees an insight how the finite element method works and the way in which programs are
put together. The course will discuss the selection of soil properties for geotechnical analysis by finite elements and demonstrate finite element applications to classical geotechnical problems that include settlement, seepage and stability. In particular, one session will be devoted to a description and
demonstration of thewidely disseminated finite element slope stability program slope1.
Participants are encouraged to bring their own laptop computers so they can install some of the finite elements programs and get them running during the course.
All participants will receive a complete set of course notes and a CD holding source code to over 50 finite element programs. Optional purchase of the textbook will be available on-site at the discounted rate of $65.
#5 DAM SAFETY RISK ANALYSIS—A G OTECHNICAL PERSPECTIVE
Karl M. Dise, P.E., M. ASCE
Bureau of Reclamation
Gregg A. Scott, P.E., F. ASCE
Bureau of Reclamation
Nathan J. Snorteland, P.E.
Corps of Engineers
The dam safety profession has been steadily moving toward risk-based methods for making important decisions with regard to operations and structural modifications at dams. The Bureau of Reclamation, owner of major Federal dams in the western U.S. including Hoover and Grand Coulee Dams (as well as many smaller structures), has been performing risk analyses as the primary dam safety decision tool for over 15 years. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has also been pursuing risk-based methods for dam safety decision making over the past several years in cooperation with the Bureau of Reclamation. This course will cover
basic and practical dam safety risk analysis approaches from the training program developed
for Bureau of Reclamation staff, with focus on geotechnical failure modes. Topics to be covered include failure mode analysis, hazard analysis, event tree development, reliability analysis, subjective probability and expert elicitation, seismic and internal erosion risks for embankment dams, combining and portraying
risks, building the “dam safety case” from a risk perspective, public risk tolerance and risk guidelines, and qualitative/ semiquantitative methods.
#7 INTRODUCTION TO INSTRUMENTATION AND MONITORING IN GEOTECHNICAL ENGINEERING
Magued Iskander, Ph.D., P.E., M.ASCE
Polytechnic Institute of NYU
The use of field instrumentation to monitor the insitu behavior of foundation soils, embankments and structures is being required more and more on many construction projects. However, few universities offer
a course on instrumentation as part of the civil engineering curriculum and so many engineers learn on-the-job and through the school of ‘hard knocks’. This one-day seminar will provide a comprehensive introduction to instrumentation and monitoring of civil engineering projects including planning, design of instrumentation programs, and performance of commonly used sensors, data acquisition, signal conditioning, error
analysis, information management and case histories. The seminar will combine elements from civil, mechanical and electrical engineering together with some management concepts.
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