Abstract --
Taiwan is full of hills and mountains, most of the roadway systems
are located in hilly areas. At the same time, Taiwan is rich in
precipitation, serious landslides or loss of foundation materials
often occur after rainfalls. The instability of the roadway slopes
directly affects the safety of the highway users. There have been
research efforts to establish policies for handling the safety of
roadway slopes and some of the research works are underway. Many
important sections of roadways have been monitored and analyzed
either due to previous failure or signs of potential failure. The
results of instrumentation have been used as a basis for the management
of these roadways. The objectives of this two-year research project
are to:(1) advance our capabilities in slope stability monitoring;
(2) to make sure that the instrumentation data substantially reflect
the actual conditions of the slope; (3) to improve cost effectiveness
of monitoring system; and (4) establish guidelines in developing
a warning system that incorporates the instrumentation system. The
execution of the first-year project started in April and ended in
December of 2002. Major tasks include: (1) literature collection
and organization; (2) evaluation of conventional slope stability
monitoring systems; (3) laboratory developments of fiber optic and
TDR sensors; (4) preliminary field implementation of fiber optic
and TDR sensor systems, and (5) development of guidelines for the
establishment of warning systems. A ground movement monitoring system
based on fiber optic gratings has been developed. A series of TDR
technology based sensor devices which include a ground disruption
movement sensor, an extensometer, a ground water level sensor, and
a rainfall metering device have also been developed. The warning
system development which included classification of landslides types,
case histories on the use of a warning system, methodology of establishing
a warning system have been completed. This report describes details
of the background, contents and accomplishments of the research
in the first year.
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