Abstract
The Cheng-Lan railway links Chengdu, a central city in Southwestern China, and Lanzhou, a central city in Northwestern China. The railway passes through the Longmenshan fault zone (Wenchuan earthquake happened there on May 12, 2008), Minjiang fault zone, and Dongkunlun fault zone, which are all active. It runs over the Yangtze River and the Yellow River, and crosses high mountains and deep valleys. There exists, along the railway’s alignment, different kinds of strata of hard granite and soft, weak metamorphic rocks such as carbonaceous slate, schist, and phyllite. It is, therefore, a key issue for such an infrastructure construction to assess the engineering geological conditions and risks, so as to mitigate or avoid possible georisks and to offer optional designs. Geological survey and georisk assessment along the railway corridor are carried out. Special attention is given to active faults, earthquakes and seismic zones. Based on these, discussions about geological aspects for route selection of the railway are conducted and countermeasures for georisk control are proposed accordingly. Main conclusions are achieved as follows: (1) Geohazards such as landslides, rockfalls and debries flows dominate both the route selection of the railway and the engineering structures (e.g., tunnels or bridges) adopted; (2) Tunnel has been proved to be an excellent structure for linear engineering in geologically active area; and (3) In the case where avoiding is impractical, necessary protection measures should be taken to engineering slopes in high earthquake intensity areas, especially the area with earthquake of Ms. 8 or greater.
Article PDF
Similar content being viewed by others
Reference
Chen CH, Li B (2006) Geohazard risk assessment for small hydroelectric power stations — A case study of a construction site in Meiniduo River, Yunnan Province. Chinese Journal of Geological Hazard and Control 17(3): 66–72.
Du YB, Yuan CB, Wang YD (2012) Major Geological Hazard and Geological Alignment of Chengdu — Lanzhou Railway. Journal of Railway Engineering Society 8: 11–15.
Gao XH, Qi FQ, Feng J (2012) Application of geohazard risk assessment in the shallow-sea oil-gas development area of liaodong bay. Marine Geology Frontiers 2: 18–26.
Huang RQ, Li WL (2008) Analysis of the geo- hazards triggered by the 12 May (2008) Wenchuan Earthquake in China. Bulletin of Engineering Geology and the Environment 68(3): 363–371. DOI: 10.1007/s10064-009-0207-0.
Huang RQ, Li WL (2009) A Study on the Development and Distribution Rules of Geo-hazards Triggered by the 5.12 Wenchuan Earthquake. Science in China (Series E)- Technological Sciences 52(4): 810–819.
Li TB (2011) Damage to mountain tunnels related to the Wenchuan earthquake and some suggestions for aseismic tunnel construction. Bulletin of Engineering Geology and the Environment. DOI: 10.1007/s10064-011-0367-6.
Li Y, Allen PA, Densmorel AL, Xu Q (2003) Evolution of the Longmen Shan Foreland Basin (Western Sichuan, China) during the Late Triassic Indosinian Orogeny. Basin Research 15: 117–138. DOI: 10.1046/j.1365-2117.2003.00197.x.
Li YR, Aydin A, Xiang XQ, Ju NP, et al. (2012) Landslide susceptibility mapping and evaluation along a river valley in China. Acta Geologica Sinica 86(4): 1022–1030. DOI: 10.1111/j.1755-6724.2012.00726.x.
Qing SH, Huang RQ, Li D, Jiang LW (2006) Railway location in a mountainous environment in areas of active structures. Journal of Geomechanics 12(2): 243–251. DOI: 10.3969/j.issn.1006-6616.2006.02.018.
The Second Survey and Design Institute of China Railways (2010) Engineering Geological Assessment Report of Chengdu-Lanzhou Railway.
Zhou CJ, Wu ZH (2011) The characteristics of geothermal field along the Dali-Ruili railway in Western Yunnan Province and their implications for geo-engineering. Geological Bulletin of China 31(3): 326–336. DOI: 10.3969/j.issn.1671-2552.2012.02.016.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 International License ( https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0 ), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
About this article
Cite this article
Huang, Rq., Li, Yr., Qu, K. et al. Engineering geological assessment for route selection of railway line in geologically active area: A case study in China. J. Mt. Sci. 10, 495–508 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11629-013-2660-2
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11629-013-2660-2