and as pointed out elsewhere (12), it can be quite misleading to consider

only the soil forces.

Despite their criticism of the specific design recommendations, the
writers believe this is an important and timely paper; not so much be-
cause of the numerical results, for clearly they refer only to a specific
and rather anomalous situation, but rather because in demonstrating the
existence of a potentially significant and hitherto neglected effect, even
in one specific situation, the authors have both sounded a note of cau-
tion and pointed the way forward to the imperative need for further
work to examine its nature and its limits.

APPENDIX.—-REFERENCES

20. Aitken, G. H., "Seismic Response of Retaining Walls," Civil Engineering Re-
search Report 82-5, Department of Civil Engineering, University of Canter-
bury, Christchurch, New Zealand, 1982.
21. Wood, J. H., "Earthquake-Induced Soil Pressures on Structures," Report No.
EERL 73-05, Earthquake Engineering Research Laboratory, California Insti-
tute of Technology, Pasadena, Calif., 1973.

Discussion by Nandakumaran Paruvakat,5 M. ASCE

The paper is an excellent contribution towards understanding the in-

adequately investigated problem of retaining wall displacement during
earthquakes.
In the writer's opinion, the use of rigid plastic behavior of backfill in
the R-E model and Zarrabi's model has another disadvantage besides
that given by the authors (that amplification of motion cannot be taken
into account). The model is not adaptable for the case of rotation of re-
taining walls. A survey of damages during past earthquakes will readily
show that the majority of failures of retaining walls are by rotation of
the walls.
The use of the Finite Element Model has been accomplished in the
present work by the assumption of a thin failure surface in advance. For
the simple case of pure horizontal vibrations, it appears that such an
assumption will be adequate when the inertia forces tend to displace the
wall away from the backfill. The writer believes that when the inertia
forces are reversed and the wall has a tendency to move towards the
backfill, the above assumption will lead to over-estimation of the resis-
tance from the backfill. Since the inertia forces act back and forth many
times during an earthquake, the consequences are worth investigating.
It is also felt that for a self-healing material like sand, the observation
of a single rupture surface in tests may not be sufficient reason for their
use in theories, since failure surface develops only when the wall moves
away.
The writer's work (22) indicated a strong influence of the amplification
of vibrations of retaining walls on their displacement during earth-
quakes. In that work, however, the amplification in the motions as in-
5
Sr. Proj. Engr., GMC Assoc, Inc., Northville, Mich. 48167.
1162
fluenced by the soil characteristics in the foundation of the retaining wall
and behind it (represented by its bulk-behavior) were considered, as op-
posed to the concept used by the authors (that of a soil deposit without
a wall). It will, therefore, be interesting to determine the effect of the
assumed values of Cs of the slip elements on the results obtained.
Using simple calculations performed by the writer, it was seen that
for the case reported in the paper, the natural frequency of the retaining
wall in pure translation was 6.75 Hz. This is very nearly equal to the
fundamental frequencies of the deposit reported, and so, no conclusions
could be obtained as to which aspect predominates. Was this aspect in-
vestigated by the authors?
The most noteworthy aspect of the paper is the design recommen-
dation. But, the writer would like to caution that the following points
need to be further studied before they are used in designs:

1. Does the factor of safety in the R-E method account for the uncer-
tainty in the model, which does not account for rotation of the gravity
retaining wall?
2. Providing that the answer for the above question is "yes," what is
the effect of: (a) The assumption of a pre-determined failure surface; and
(b) the assumed stiffness properties of the slip elements on the results
and thus, the design recommendations?

The writer believes that the actual earth pressures behind any retain-
ing wall are important only if the walls cannot be permitted to displace,
so as to bring about "active" conditions. Under those conditions, will
the conclusion regarding the earthquake-induced redistribution and an
increase in pressure by 30% remain valid, in view of the fact that the
present study pertains to a case in which the wall displaces in translation?

APPENDIX.—REFERENCE

22. Paruvakat, N., "Behaviour of Retaining Walls Under Dynamic Loads," thesis
presented to the University of Roorkee, at Roorkee, India, in 1973, in partial
fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy.

Closure by Farrokh Nadim6 and Robert V. Whitman7

The finite element model used in the original paper certainly has short-
comings and is not intended as the perfect model for analyzing the seis-
mic response of gravity retaining walls. It is, to the writers' knowledge,
the first model to incorporate the effects of both "elastic" deformability
and limited shear resistance in the backfill. These two effects had pre-
viously been investigated separately (7,21), resulting in quite different
conclusions. The analysis in the paper demonstrates the interplay be-
tween these two aspects of the problem. The writers agree with the dis-
cussers that the results must be viewed as general rather than specific.
'Research
7
Fellow, Norwegian Geotechnical Inst., Oslo, Norway.
Prof. of Civ. Engrg., Massachusetts Inst, of Tech., Cambridge, Mass.
1163