Environmental Engineering Commons^™

Beam-To-Column Minor Axis Moment Connections, Ali Purcell, John J. Murphy, Kieran Ruane

Civil Engineering Research in Ireland 2020

Steel moment connections are used where continuity is required between beam and columns. Research on moments connections has primarily focussed on major-axis connections. An in-depth investigation of I.S. EN 1993-1-8 was completed to identify the design rules of connections. Simple connections such as cleats, fin plates and splices were investigated briefly in order to gain a greater understanding of how they behave and transfer load before researching two types of minor axis moment connections; one where the end plate is connected directly to the column web and one where the end plate is bolted to another plate which is welded …

Structural Modelling, Analysis And Design Of Composite Steel Frame Building Using An Integrated Design Approach, Muhammad S. Hassan, Graham Williams, Karol Przybylski, Lawrence Budzisz, Frank Maguire

Civil Engineering Research in Ireland 2020

With modern computerisation, structural analysis and design practice have changed significantly over the last two decades. Design practice now requires robust design methodologies that can save time, produce cost-effective solutions, reduce human error, and be able to produce fully compatible building information models (BIM). In this context, the paper presents a robust design approach for a composite steel frame building project. In this approach, structural steel elements can be modelled, analysed, design and detailed in a unified computational framework based on the ‘MasterSeries’ software package, which incorporates design variables, material specification, loading combinations, connection details, default set code standard criterion, …

Effective Measures To Improve Road Safety At Toll Plazas In Ireland, David Collery, Grzegorz Gorecki

Civil Engineering Research in Ireland 2020

Road safety statistics from toll plazas, show that the occurrence of collisions in their vicinity is often disproportionally higher than on other sections of the same roads. Despite the presence of lower speed limits in these locations, various manoeuvres, especially on the approaches to toll plazas, pose higher risk of collisions. A lack of strictly unified design standard for Irish toll plazas is the reason for different road safety approach in various locations. The standards are mainly focused on toll plazas operation (Abuzwidah & Abdel-Aty, 2015). Also Abdel-Aty et al. (2016) mentions a clear lack of design codes or guidelines …

Implementing Sustainable Transport Strategies In Ireland, Kevin Gallagher, Brian Mccann

Civil Engineering Research in Ireland 2020

Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans (SUMPs) provide a concept and process for the planning, development and implementation of urban transport strategies. EU SUMP guidelines have not been utilised in Ireland. The research question asks if there is any benefit in developing Irish urban transport strategies as SUMPs. The literature review examines the historical development of EU and Irish transport policy and reviews academic reports and journal articles on SUMPs. The EU SUMP process is reviewed in detail before reviewing recently published Irish urban transport strategies and a European SUMP case study. The research methodology involved collecting qualitative data from primary sources, …

Effect Of Motorways On Road Safety In Ireland, Parth B. Shah, Ajinkya S. Mane, Bidisha Ghosh

Civil Engineering Research in Ireland 2020

In Ireland, high-speed motorways were built around the year 2008 to 2010. In order to investigate the effect of motorways on road safety, the research paper aims at identifying the shift of contributing factors related to vehicular crashes, before-and-after the construction of motorways/expressways. Typically, several factors are involved for accidents on motorways, but a better understanding is needed to find the relationship between injury severity and its contributing factors. The current study seeks to find the contributing factors for before-and-after the construction of motorways. In this study, the before period is considered from 2003-2007, and 2012 to 2016 have been …

Evaluation Of Sustainability Of Irish Road Transport Sector And Its Comparison With European Union Countries, Megha Jose Kandappasery, Boban Djordjevic, Bidisha Ghosh

Civil Engineering Research in Ireland 2020

Transport sustainability has been the topic of discussion since the past two decades and its importance has been recognised by most countries. Therefore, strategies and policies incorporating sustainable growth and development have been initiated as a measure to steer transport growth in the right path. This notion has led researchers to develop many ways of measuring transport sustainability, especially the frequently used road transport sector. Measurement of sustainability of the transport sector has been carried out using different methodologies in the past. Considering the complexity and multi-dimensional aspects of sustainability, multi-criteria analysis decision making tools have been considered in this …

Analysis Of Inclement Weather On Traffic Flow – An Irish National Roads Case Study, Beatriz Martinez-Pastor, Páraic Carroll

Civil Engineering Research in Ireland 2020

Transportation networks and infrastructure are increasingly exposed to and effected by inclement weather. The rise in the frequency and intensity of these events is increasingly affecting the normal operation, performance and functionality of roads and highways, leading to costly losses. Inclement weather creates risky and hazardous situations not only on the main roads, such as motorways, but also, on the smaller roads connecting rural parts of the country that experience lower traffic volumes. The effects of weather events, such as rainfalls or snowfalls, have been primarily addressed in main roads, leaving, smaller roads on hold. This has created a lack …

Identifying Damage In A Bridge By Analysing Rotation Response To A Moving Load, Claire Mcgeown, Farhad Huseynov, David Hester, Patrick Mcgetrick, Eugene O'Brien, Vikram Pakrashi

Civil Engineering Research in Ireland 2020

A recent survey of Europe’s highway infrastructure has concluded that almost half of Europe’s bridges are nearing the end of their design live. Work in the wider Structural Health Monitoring sector is aiming to develop reliable and cost-effective methods for verifying condition, remaining service life and safety of ageing structures. Most bridge condition assessment methods are based on deflection, acceleration or strain measurements. This paper looks at the possibility of using rotation measurements as a main parameter to identify damage. This study looks at numerical analyses of a moving point load on a one-dimensional bridge model to provide the theoretical …

Modelling The Thermal Behaviour Of A Precast Pcm Enhanced Concrete Cladding Panel, Dervilla Niall, Roger P. West, Oliver Kinnane, Richard Hegarty

Civil Engineering Research in Ireland 2020

According to the World Business Council for Sustainable Development there is currently a stock of more than 80 million buildings in Europe built between 1950 and 1975, a period during which energy performance was not considered in building design. To enable governments to comply with the European Directive 2010/31/EU on the energy performance of buildings, strategies are required to improve the energy efficiency of these buildings. Using the mass of a building to store or dissipate heat can reduce the demand on the auxiliary heating and/or cooling systems and hence reduce the overall energy demand of the building.

Previous research …

Analysis And Design Of A Novel Heavy-Duty Precast Element, Daniel Naughton, Michael Naughton, Michael O'Sullivan, Suhaib Salawdeh

Civil Engineering Research in Ireland 2020

Window sills are common to most buildings. In Ireland, concrete is the most popular material used for external sills. A standard one-metre concrete window sill weighs about 70kg. While external window sills are required to have sufficient capacity to resist damage during transportation and loading, they are non-structural elements. Therefore, there is no need for their high selfweight. This project looks to redesign concrete window sills to make them lighter. Decreasing the amount of concrete used in each sill would significantly reduce their self-weight. This would make concrete window sills more manageable in terms of transportation and installation. Two design …

Composite Behaviour Of Wide Sandwich Panels With High Performance Concrete Thin Wythes With And Without Thermomass Shear Connectors, Jagoda Lipczynska, Roger P. West, Michael Grimes, Dervilla Niall, Oliver Kinnane, Richard Hegarty

Civil Engineering Research in Ireland 2020

To partly address the future sustainability of energy use in buildings, there is a program in Europe to retrofit domestic and commercial buildings with non-load bearing insulated re-cladding and over-cladding panels. Recent research work has shown that limited composite action is possible depending on the type of non-conductive shear connector and the stiffness of the insulation between the inner and outer wythes. This paper reports on the mix design development to develop high strength 20mm thick wythes and the manufacture of sandwich panels with five silicone-bonded layers of XPS insulation, making up a panel which is 220mm thick. These model …

Development And Localisation Of Ultra High Performance Concrete Using A Particle Packing Model, William Wilson, Tomas O'Flaherty

Civil Engineering Research in Ireland 2020

Ultra-high performance fibre reinforced concrete (UHPFRC) is used worldwide to improve the structural performance of infrastructure such as bridges, extend their working life and reduce environmental impact. As a result thinner structures are constructed leading to reductions in the structure’s self-weight and the volume of concrete and natural raw aggregates used in their construction. A drawback to UHPFRC is that it results in a significant rise in initial costs over normal and even high performance concretes, and it has very high binder contents, which in some cases is greater than 1100kg/m³. Therefore, the cost-efficiency and sustainability of this …

Effects Of Accelerated Carbonation Curing On Co2 Sequestration And On The Compressive Strength Of Concrete Masonry Units, Barry Gilroy, Leon Black, David Thompson, Ronan Hogan, Niall Holmes

Civil Engineering Research in Ireland 2020

The global consumption of Portland cement has risen to over 4 billion tonnes per annum. Its manufacture is energy and carbon intensive and approximately 900 kg of CO₂ is emitted into the atmosphere for each tonne of Portland cement produced. The International Energy Agency (IEA) roadmap sets out a goal to reduce emissions due to cement production to 18 % below 2006 levels by 2050.

Concrete has the potential to re-absorb CO₂ by the process of carbonation, where it reacts with CaO in the concrete to form calcium carbonate. Accelerated carbonation curing (ACC) is a technique for curing …

Towards Improved Sensor Systems For Bridge Structural Health Monitoring, Alan Ferguson, Roger Woods, David Hester

Civil Engineering Research in Ireland 2020

Taking long-term measurements on in-service bridges is challenging due to the lack of easy access to power and communications. Whilst all-in-one, portable sensor data loggers act to address these challenges, they still lack the flexibility to meet evolving measurement needs. This paper presents the design and implementation of a highly flexible, modular sensor system for bridge structural health monitoring research, which has an emphasis on customisability and extensibility to allow it to meet evolving challenges. The architecture incorporates interchangeable sensor modules that allows data acquisition to an on-board Secure Digital card, with timing and synchronisation provided by global positioning system …

Towards Automated Uav Assisted Bridge Inspections Using Photogrammetry And Image Processing Techniques, Habeene Habeenzu, Patrick Mcgetrick, David Hester, Su Taylor, Louie Wong

Civil Engineering Research in Ireland 2020

At the heart of addressing bridge condition challenges are bridge inspections. The main activity during a bridge inspection is close, arm’s length visual inspection of the entire bridge structure. During this process, all defects such as cracks, spalls and material degradation are manually recorded on the bridge itself and on inspection forms. Where access is difficult such as where a safe working platform cannot be mounted under bridge decks, or on high bridges, expensive underbridge equipment is required which when used results in expensive lane closures. Furthermore, visual inspections have been shown to lack consistency from inspector to inspector and …

Acceleration Based Bridge Weigh In Motion Using Moving Force, Shou Wang, Daniel Mccrum, Eugene O'Brien

Civil Engineering Research in Ireland 2020

Measuring vehicle axles weights is an important method to control traffic and monitor infrastructure. Traditional methods of measuring the static weight of vehicles at a weigh station is disruptive and time consuming. It is more cost effective and efficient to indirectly measure moving vehicle weights crossing a bridge. The weigh-in-motion concept, first proposed by Moses (1979) is an algorithm that uses measured bridge structural response (deflection, strain, …) due to passing vehicles to and a theoretical response. Moving Force identification (MFI) is a variation of the dynamic WIM algorithm that gives a force time history as a vehicle passes the …

A Two-Stage Direct Integration Approach To Find The Railway Track Profile Using In-Service Trains, Yifei Ren, Jennifer Kennahan, Eugene O'Brien

Civil Engineering Research in Ireland 2020

The railway track is an important element in transportation networks. In recent years, drive-by monitoring of railways has become more popular. Using data measured from in-service trains, the railway profile can be found. In previous research, a complex optimiziton method is used to calculate the railway profile. This paper introduces a new two-stage direct integration approach to find the same track profile much more efficiently. The calculated track profile is similar to a ‘true’ profile and can be used to monitor the condition of the track.

Investigating The Contact-Point Response For Drive-By Damage Detection In Bridges, Robert Corbally, Abdollah Malekjafarian

Civil Engineering Research in Ireland 2020

Bridges are critical elements in any road or rail transport network and ensuring their safety is paramount. Recent years have seen significant research efforts to develop cost-effective techniques for bridge monitoring on a large scale. Drive-by bridge inspection techniques, whereby sensors inside a vehicle are used to monitor bridge condition, are at the focus of much of this work. This paper develops a relationship between the measured response in a vehicle and the contact-point response between the wheel and the surface of a bridge using a quarter-car representation of the vehicle. Numerical simulations are carried out to examine the feasibility …

Application Of The Iec Technical Specification For Assessment Of Wave Energy Resource: A Case Study From The West Coast Of Ireland, Iulia Anton, Stephen Nash

Civil Engineering Research in Ireland 2020

There is significant interest globally in harnessing our ocean wave energy resource, estimated at approximately 30,000 TWh/year. The key to this is understanding the resource. The International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) has developed a technical specification for the evaluation of wave energy resource, IEC-TS 62600- 101: Wave energy resource assessment and characterization. This research applies the IEC standard for a resource characterization study of the Atlantic Marine Energy Test Site on the west coast of Ireland. A key focus is the comparison of the detailed IEC validation approach using scatter diagrams with the traditional timeseries validation approach. Coarse (0.005°) and fine …

Wind Power Prediction And Early Downtime Detection For Ireland, Vikram Pakrashi, Basuraj Bhowmik, Juan Manuel González-Sopeña, Paul Mucchielli, Bidisha Ghosh

Civil Engineering Research in Ireland 2020

Wind energy must be commercially competitive to be economically sustainable. Existing wind farms in Ireland must be more efficient to meet the 2009 EU Renewable Energy Directive target of 7% of total energy demand from onshore wind energy farms, which is 45% of the total national renewable energy target of 16%. WindPearl - a Sustainable EnergyAuthority of Ireland (SEAI) funded project is currently looking into improvin operations & maintenance (O&M) of onshore wind turbine farms in Ireland.