Investigating the Behaviour of Buildings with Different Foundation Types on Soft Soils: Two Case Studies in the Netherlands

Abstract

Investigating the behaviour of buildings is extremely useful for planning interventions aimed at their safeguarding, although hardly affordable over large urbanized areas. In this regard, DInSAR-derived building settlements can provide a valuable contribution. This paper presents a procedure tailored for deriving empirical fragility curves for buildings that might be affected by differential settlements on the basis of the combined use of DInSAR data and the results of damage surveys. The case studies deal with two municipalities in The Netherlands where masonry buildings mainly rest on soft soils (i.e. peats and organic clays). The behaviour of buildings with different foundation types (i.e. shallow and deep) is analyzed and a check of the performance of a restored foundation is carried out via the analysis of pre- and post-intervention DInSAR-derived settlement trends.