Seismic response characteristics of multi-story subway station through shaking table test

A series of shaking table tests were carried out to investigate the seismic response characteristics of a multi-story subway station. Dynamic responses, including accelerations of the soils and the underground structure, layer drift, dynamic earth pressure, and lateral deformation of soils were recorded and analyzed. Several seismic characteristics of multi-story subway station structures are figured out. It is found that in addition to the racking deformation, the rotation vibration is observed for the multi-story subway station subjected to acceleration waves. From the viewpoint of frequency, the low-frequency component and high-frequency component of the acceleration response of the subway station represent the translation and rotation component of the multi-story subway structure, respectively. In addition, the rotation vibration of the deep-depth structure leads to the local squeezing and detachment from the surrounding soils alternately at both top and bottom ends of the sidewalls. This results in the hump-shaped distribution of dynamic earth pressure. The racking deformation of the multi-story subway station has a linear relationship with the dynamic earth pressure at a certain area along the sidewall, where the top of hump-shaped distribution of dynamic earth pressure is.