This contribution focuses on a coupling approach between a seismic event and an open trench with sheet walls. It is discussed whether an inclined trench can effectively reduce surface vibrations due to incident P- and SV-waves. A linear approach in the frequency domain is considered to model ground-borne vibrations resulting from small earthquakes or underground traffic. Such ground-borne vibrations may reduce the serviceability of affected buildings and can cause discomfort or health issues for residents. The methodology employs a 2D coupling approach between the free-field solution of a seismic event and the scattered wave field around an empty trench with sheet walls. The seismic event is considered to be either a plane wave front or body waves induced by a point source. The scattered wave field in the soil medium is modelled with the Wave Based Method (WBM), which uses weighted wave functions to describe a boundary value problem. These wave functions consist of propagating and evanescent wave patterns, which exactly fulfil the underlying differential equations of the elastodynamic medium. The unknown weighting values are derived within a weighted residual approach, which weakly enforces the boundary conditions of the soil domain. The sheet walls are modelled as an Euler-Bernoulli beam that is coupled to the WBM model, as shown in [1]. The WBM is chosen because it presents an efficient numerical method that requires significantly fewer degrees of freedom than the Finite Element Method, while achieving high convergence rates. This becomes especially beneficial when considering a poroelastic soil medium with additional degrees of freedom, as revealed, for example, in [2]. The expansion of the coupling approach presented here to a poroelastic soil medium is part of future work. [1] Lainer M., Müller G., Efficient treatment of a thin-walled wave barrier in a (poro)elastic structure with the Wave Based Method, Computers and Geotechnics, 186, 107409, 2025. [2] Lainer M., Müller G., A wave based approach for the assessment of fluid–solid coupling for a scattered wave field at an empty canyon, Soil Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering, 200, 109827, 2026.