Ground‐water movement toward artificial cuts

Artificial cuts, such as open channels and highway cuts, produce an imbalance in the original ground‐water system. The developed drawdowns due to these cuts under the condition of saturated steady flow are studied theoretically by analyzing the seepage through trapezoidal sections of earth entailing the complexity of the free surface. The procedure is then extended to actual cases of extensive aquifers where such cuts exist. The proposed method is compared with some of the available rigorous mathematical solutions, such as those given by Falkovich, Mikhailov, Meletchenko, Pavlovsky, and Polubarinova‐Kochina. The proposed method is simpler in its application and also gives a complete solution for the free surface, the discharge face, the rate of flow, and the hydropotential distribution within the affected region, whereas the rigorous methods are planned essentially for the solution of the free surface only.