The influence of confinement on the bearing capacity of strip footings

The bearing capacity for a strip footing acting on a soil foundation with rigid boundaries at a finite distance is investigated within the framework of the Yield design theory both for a purely cohesive soil and for a frictional soil. It is shown that the analysis can be performed simply by referring to already existing results concerning the bearing capacity of a strip footing on a soil layer with limited thickness. Each bearing capacity factor in Terzaghi formula is increased by a factor that increases when the distance of the rigid boundary to the edge of the footing decreases. The bearing capacity is proved to be the more sensitive to this confining effect as the friction angle of the soil increases. From a physical point of view this theoretical analysis would show that, when effective, confinement reduces the depth of the soil layer involved in the collapse mechanism. © 2002 Académie des sciences/Éditions scientifiques et médicales Elsevier SAS.