Cement-based materials are the most widely used building materials and have two main problems: low flexural/tensile strength and low sustainability. To solve these two problems at the same time, the strategy of the utilization of fillers as cement paste replacement and utilization of fiber was proposed. Mixes with varying PVA fiber and LF were produced for workability and mechanical properties measurement and analysis. The results showed that the addition of PVA fibers reduced the flowability and bonding, while the addition of LF similarly reduced the flowability but enhanced its bonding. Both effects on strength showed an increase and then a decrease. An analysis of microstructure and chemical composition demonstrated that the addition of PVA fiber and/or LF first decreased the porosity, and a further addition increased the porosity. The mixes with 0.2% fiber content showed fracture failure mode, while the mixes with 0.4–0.6% fiber content showed the pulling out of failure mode. A mix with 0.2% fiber content and 10% LF content exhibited concurrently good workability and mechanical properties.
To avoid cumbersome casting procedures in the production of pervious concrete, a new type of casting method through coating cementitious paste onto the preplaced aggregate skeleton is developed. To optimize the key performances and reveal their governing mechanism, aggregate skeleton–cementitious paste-coating pervious concrete (ACPC) mixes with different porosity, water/cement (w/c) ratio and sand ratio were produced and had their permeability and strength tested. This study demonstrated that it is successful to produce pervious concrete by the novel casting method. Vibration of aggregate skeleton and high w/c ratio should not be adopted to avoid the formation of a layer of hardened paste at the bottom of the mix to block the vertical passage of water. In contrast to conventional concrete, a higher w/c ratio (from 0.23 to 0.34) generally resulted in a higher strength (from 3.77 to 8.71 MPa) of ACPC. A small amount of sand increased both the permeability and strength through the balling bearing effect and filling effect, respectively. Both the optimum sand ratio to achieve the highest vertical permeability and strength were found to be 0.05, which offered this porous structure concurrently satisfactory permeability (permeability coefficient higher than grade K2) and acceptable strength (compressive strength higher than 5 MPa). Key influencing factors of permeability and strength of ACPC were analyzed. This study can advance the technology of casting concrete and the production of pervious concrete as road pavement in the construction of “sponge city”.