Purpose <p>Most existing studies on pile barriers focus on free-field vibration mitigation, yet rarely fully account for soil cross-anisotropy and quantify the screening effect on adjacent elastic thin plate vibrations induced by moving loads. This study proposes a new analytical approach for mitigating vibrations of adjacent elastic thin plates induced by moving loads in layered cross-anisotropic saturated media using pile rows.</p> Methods <p>The stiffness matrix of cross-anisotropic saturated soils is derived using the analytical layer-element method. Based on this soil stiffness matrix, a boundary-element mesh approach is introduced to formulate the plate-soil interaction equation. Combined with the vibration theory of elastic thin plates, the vibration response of plates without pile isolation is obtained. The piles, modeled as Euler–Bernoulli beams, are analyzed via finite element theory, and the boundary element method is then used to derive the vibration response of the pile rows. Finally, the screening performance of the pile barrier in reducing vibrations of the adjacent thin plate is assessed based on vibration reduction theory.</p> Results <p>The results shows that the isolation efficiency of pile barriers is slightly improved with increasing plate-soil stiffness ratio, and significantly enhanced by rising soil cross-anisotropy. A critical overlying soil-layer thickness (h=4b) is identified for optimal vibration mitigation, while soil permeability has a negligible influence on isolation performance.</p> Conclusion <p>This study presents the vibration isolation mechanism of pile barriers for adjacent plate foundations in cross-anisotropic saturated soils, and the findings provide a technical reference for vibration control design of raft foundations in traffic engineering.</p>