Improvement of acquisition methods for geotechnical data and on site application of numerical simulation methods

The planned construction of the traffic ways through the central and eastern European Alps represents a challenge for science and technology that is comparable with the construction of the great Alpine rail tunnels in the past century. In the past decades, Austria has achieved a leading position in the field of tunnelling. This is verified by many successful projects all over the world, which were realised with the well-known New Austrian Tunnelling Method. However, further development and economic success of modern tunnelling methods, which are still partly based on empirical assumptions, can only be assured if it is possible to establish a more solid and sound scientific basis for them. For this reason, the Austrian Science Fund established a Joint Research Initiative (JRI) "Numerical Simulation in Tunnelling" in spring 1997. The budget for the the total duration of 5 years is 2,1 Millions. The JRI consists of 7 Projects and involves 8 Austrian University institutes at Graz, Innsbruck and Vienna. Univ.-Prof. Dipl.-Ing. Dr. techn. Gernot Beer (Head of the Institute for Structural Analysis at Technical University Graz ) has taken over the coordination of the JRI. Additionally, in December 1997 a further project was established that is associated with the JRI. The aims of the JRI are: development of the scientific and technological basis of numerical simulation in tunnelling development of on site devices for data collection, for example for the automatic geological data acquisition using stereophotogrammetric techniques substantial improvement and further development of computer-aided simulation models in conjunction with in situ measurements further and new developments of simulation and visualization software including their application in tunnelling The purpose of this work is to achieve a good correlation between numerical prognosis and the actual in situ behaviour. The technical aim of the JRI is to develop and apply numerical simulation tools to the estimation of the required tunnel support and the required construction measures and their impact on the environment at the planning stage and during construction. This will result in an improvement of the safety and economy of tunnels. Therefore, different aspects of tunnelling are considered, from the acquisition of data to the development of efficient algorithms for the numerical simulation of tunnelling in highly deformable soil. Besides basic research, which represents the central element of the JRI, a close collaboration with the Austrian tunnelling industry is undertaken. A management advisory council was established, consisting of representatives of Austrian tunnelling firms and tunnelling experts. The access to the major tunnel construction sites in Austria is assured and new findings and developments can be immediately applied in practice. List of Projects 1. Coordination und Visualization - G. Beer 2. Site Application - W. Schubert 3. Damage Tensor - G. Swoboda 4. Groundwater Control - G. Hofstetter 5. Compressed Air - S. Semprich 6. Shotcrete - H. Mang 7. Large Deformations - G. Meschke A. Shear Bands - H.F. Schweiger