20110020066 | Reinforced Soil Arch - This invention relates to a novel design of reinforced soil arches which can be used to construct bridges, overpasses, underpasses, snow sheds, landslide and rock fall protection structures, and the like. The reinforced soil arch comprises alternating layers of compacted mineral soil and geosynthetic reinforcement located on and adjacent to each side of an arch form to construct a versatile and environmentally compatible reinforced soil arch that can be used for numerous purposes. The invention includes a method of constructing a self-supporting reinforced soil arch comprising: (a) placing on the ground at the location where the soil arch is to be erected an archway form, said top surface of said archway form having disposed thereon a plurality of shear resisting devices; (b) erecting adjacent to and on the archway form a combination of alternating and interacting layers of compacted mineral soil and geosynthetic reinforcement material, the interface between the alternating layers of compacted mineral soil and geosynthetic reinforcement material and the top surface of the archway form being connected by the series of shear resisting devices on the top surface of the archway form. | 01-27-2011 |