Retrofitting of N–W Corner of Kolkata High Court Heritage Building Through Micropiles and Grouting

Abstract

Monumental buildings keep experiencing the distresses due to weathering effects or other reasons. Micropiling had been found very useful for retrofitting works (Srivastava et al. in stability analyses of 18 m deep excavation using micropiles. IGC, N, Delhi, 2016). Kolkata High Court building is a beautiful, majestic building, built in 1872, over a large area, along Hooghly River. The North–West (N–W) corner of the building had experienced some settlement in the year 2014–2015. Authors had inspected the building in December 2015 and again in February 2016. The site visit report indicated that there was differential settlement of shallow foundation of building in its N–W corner. Ingress of Hooghly River water up to foundation was one of the possibilities of distress in foundation. The micropiling followed by grouting was found the most appropriate solution for the site. The site solutions shall be instrumented also over a period of 10 years or so, to periodically monitor the settlement, if any, of building after the treatment.