Much of the urban development in the UK is founded on heavily overconsolidated sedimentary clays, which are particularly susceptible to swelling and softening following the reduction in stress caused by retaining wall construction. Moreover, the low permeability of these clays means the swelling and softening is likely to extend over many years or decades following completion of construction. For these reasons, design of embedded walls for long term stability may be critical. This report describes the results from continued monitoring over many years of various embedded retaining structures instrumented by TRL. The types of structure fall into two categories. Firstly, the report covers walls instrumented during construction where monitoring has been continued in the longer term. Secondly, it covers walls constructed between 1972 and 1975 and instrumented whilst in service to evaluate their long term behaviour.
