Xala Tourist Development
Through the implementation of Geopier® DX1® displacement elements for soil densification, we successfully controlled settlements and significantly reduced the risk of soil liquefaction at the Xala Tourist Development.
- Owner: Constructor Tuca
- General Contractor: constructor Tuca
- Geotechnical Engineer: TGC Geotecnia
- Structural Engineer: Alba
The project involves enhancing a tourist development covering 130,000 square feet, where residential houses will be constructed, with a bearing pressure of 25 kPa located in the municipality of Tomatlán, Jalisco, México.
The project's location and geotechnical conditions required special attention to the implementation of soil improvement measures, taking into account seismic design parameters such as Mw= 7.5 and PGA (a0) of 0.7. Soil improvement was necessary to a depth of up to 4.0 meters.
Stratigraphic conditions below the Natural Ground Level (NGL) consist of a layer of loose sand with little silt up to a depth of 2.5 to 4.0 m, followed by medium to dense sandy silt up to 4.5 m, underlain by rock to the maximum exploration depth (9.0 m). During fieldwork, the Ground Water Level (GWL) was not detected. However, this could be considered up to the NGL depending on tides.
A comprehensive installation of 4,189 densification elements, each measuring 4 meters in length, was successfully completed using the DX1® system. The configuration of Geopier® elements underwent rigorous verification to ensure compliance with settlement criteria and to provide substantial improved load-bearing capacity.
Post-improvement explorations showed an average tip resistance (qc) increase of 7 MPa.
The Geopier® DX1® solution was implemented within 49 business days, accelerating the construction schedule and generating approximately a 35% cost savings when compared to the dynamic compaction alternative.
