Cracked Concrete Pavers at New Luxury Apartment Complex

A new luxury apartment complex was concerned about cracking of their pedestal supported, unreinforced concrete pavers which had showed signs of cracking and failure at select locations. The owner enlisted Walker to determine the cause of the cracking and present remediation techniques to mitigate.

After interviewing the apartment personnel, Walker learned that the garbage room was located near the center of the property which required the dumpsters to be moved to the street level for trash removal from the property. The unreinforced concrete pavers were only rated for pedestrian loading and became overstressed due to the combination of dumpster weight and impact loading on the pavers.

Walker analyzed the existing pavers using finite element analysis to determine the stresses on the existing pavers as well as solutions to mitigate further failure. These remediation techniques included:

• New concrete paver replacement
• Retrofit existing pavers using carbon fiber reinforced polymers (CFRP)
  and supplemental supports

Walker provided the owner with cost estimates and efficacy of each proposed solution.

Walker’s forensic analysis help the client pinpoint the cause of the failed pavers which minimized extraneous repairs. We provided the client with multiple solutions and associated costs while helping with their decision making process.