Insufficient bearing capacity of foundations is hazardous for construction engineering, and improper construction scheme can also lead to unexpected problems. Vertical drains are always installed in the soil foundations to accelerate the consolidation process and thus improve the bearing capacity. According to the consolidation theory proposed by Fredlund, the consolidation of unsaturated vertical drain foundation is investigated with analytical solutions, in which smear effect, drain resistance, and depth‐dependent initial excess pore pressures (i.e., excess pore‐air and pore‐water pressures) are considered. In the derivative process, the decoupling method and Fourier series expansion method are applied. The reliability of the current solutions is verified by comparing the degenerate ones with existing solutions. Sensitivity analysis is conducted to assess the consolidation characteristics of the proposed model against modeling sizes, smear coefficients, drain resistance factors, and distribution coefficients. The analytical model has the advantages of simplicity and easy to implement in practical engineering.
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