The soil- structures interaction can alter the dynamic properties of the structures. Hence, it is essential to take into account the impacts of substrate flexibility when designing methods. As soil modeling in a continuous medium is computationally complex and time-consuming, a new two-dimensional element called ElasticFoundation was introduced in OpenSees. This element functions as a beam element and helps mitigate the impact of soil-structure inertial interaction. This component was created using the beam element on a two-parameter elastic foundation with a new suggested stiffness matrix. In order to reach this objective, the outcomes from both numerical and non-linear analysis of 25 structures were utilized, spanning buildings with 1, 3, 5, 10, and 15 stories. Using these findings, a fresh stiffness matrix was implemented to characterize the two-dimensional ElasticFoundation element.

Next, the accuracy and validity of this suggested element were verified using experimental data found in the technical literature. The findings of this study revealed that the experimental structure and the proposed model had nearly identical maximum lateral displacement of 24 mm. Moreover, the mean story drifts in the suggested model and the actual sample were 0.01 and 0.02, respectively. Therefore, the suggested soil-foundation element could accurately predict the soil-foundation behavior in comparison to complete soil continuum modeling. This element considered the impact of foundation size, foundation's vertical safety factor, soil properties, building's number of stories, and structure's frequency.