Mitigation of the seismic motion near the edge of cliff-type topographies

Concentration of damage of buildings near the edge of hard or dense cliff-type topographies has been observed during a number of recent earthquakes. These observations have been interpreted by numerical dynamic analyses that illustrate the amplification of accelerations near the edge of slopes. The paper studies the effect of mitigating these accelerations using anchors both experimentally and numerically. The main issue is that if the part of the slope in which topographic amplification occurs is connected to that in which the acceleration is less, then the accelerations have to become more uniform. The experimental study involves dynamic centrifuge tests at the Cambridge University facility both with and without anchors. The numerical procedure was verified by the seismic response of the centrifuge tests. It was then applied to the study of the effect of anchors of a typical field case, the Aegion slope, under two different input motions. In all cases anchors were found effective in mitigating the seismic motion near the edge.