Evaluation of Geocell-Reinforced Pavement Constructed with Recycled Concrete Aggregate Subjected to Wheel Loads

Over the past decades, industrialization and increased construction activities have substantially raised construction and demolition waste generation. Thus, the use of recycled concrete aggregate (RCA) made of construction and demolition wastes has attracted the attention of researchers in civil engineering. In this regard, the use of RCA on low-traffic roads can significantly contribute to environmental protection. For enhancing the load-bearing characteristics in these materials, geocell reinforcement was proposed in this study. A series of experiments have been carried out to evaluate the rutting behavior of geocell-reinforced subgrades and the benefit of geocell reinforcement in RCA and other materials under moving wheel loads. The rut depth has been measured at 2, 4, 10, 20, 30, 50, and 80 passes, and the subgrade response has been evaluated in the form of rut depth-wheel pass plots. The findings demonstrated that the rutting performance of RCA was satisfactory. Recycled concrete aggregate subgrade showed the best rutting performance in reinforced and unreinforced backfills compared to other subgrades. Also, Geocell reinforcement improved the rutting performance of the RCA subgrade up to 23%.