Investigation of the soil characteristics for coastal zone land-use planning, Kandira, Izmit

Abstract

It is necessary to perform detailed soil investigations for reliable constructions in settlement areas which have a suitable topography for natural disasters such as earthquake, landslide etc. The regional and parcel-based ground surveys have great importance especially for the earthquake resistant building design in new settlement areas and the revision of the existing settlement areas. Presentation of soil properties and analysis results with zoning maps in the surveys for land use planning, contributes to the determination of risky and safe areas in terms of settlement. In this study, the soil characteristics of the study area were investigated by geological, geophysical and geotechnical studies results and the settlement suitability was evaluated with the zonation maps. The dominant geological unit in the region is Quaternary aged alluvium and on the hillsides near the seaside are covered by Upper Cretaceous aged micritic limestones belonging to Akveren Formation. 13 drilling, 15 seismic refraction, 10 MASW, 7 mikrotremor studies and results of the laboratory tests have been used for the evaluation of the soil properties in the study area. The local soil classes were determined as Z4 in the alluvium and Z2 in the limestones. The limestone strengths in the region were determined as low and middle. The hilly areas located in the west and east of the study area belonging to Akveren Formation have karstic cavities and 40% slope. These areas are not suitable for settlement.

Keywords

• Kandira
• soil investigation
• settlement suitability
• geotechnic
• zonation map