Structural Engineering Commons^™

Structural Reliability Analysis Of Corroded Steel Girder Bridge, Mohammed Shaalan Al Badran

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The natural aging, environmental impact, and appropriate design are certainly playing a serious role in safety of the bridges function. The functional safety of bridge constitutes a prime element of the transportation system serving commuters, passengers and freight. According to Federal Highway Administration, the steel bridges share represents a large amount of the United States’ bridges. In last century, the collapse of both the Silver Bridge at Point Pleasant, West Virginia over the Ohio River on December 15, 1967 and over the Mianus River Bridge in Connecticut on June 28, 1983 showed that steel corrosion has been the leading reason …

Application Of Multi-Hazard Seismic-Blast Detailing For Highway Bridges, Dominique Morton Torres

Dissertations and Theses

The increase of worldwide terrorist attacks on public transportation has heightened our concerns of protecting the nation’s transportation infrastructure. Highway bridges are an attractive target for terrorist attacks due to ease of accessibility and their overall importance to society. The primary objective of this research is to investigate multi-hazard seismic-blast correlations of blast-induced bridge components through numerical simulations of a high-precision finite element model of a typical highway bridge in New York. Seismic-detailing for blast loading on bridges has been investigated to study the correlations between seismic design for blast load effects. High-precision 3D Finite Element models of bridges detailed …

Dynamic Vulnerability Assessment Of Highway And Railway Bridges, Mehdi Mohseni

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Dynamic loads can cause severe damage to bridges, and lead to malfunction of transportation networks. A comprehensive understanding of the nature of the dynamic loads and the structural response of bridges can prevent undesired failures while keeping the cost-safety balance. Dissimilar to the static behavior, the dynamic response of bridges depends on several structural parameters such as material properties, damping and mode shapes. Furthermore, dynamic load characteristics can significantly change the structural response. In most cases, complexity and involvement of numerous parameters require the designer to investigate the bridge response via a massive numerical study.

This dissertation targets three main …

Implementation And Validation Of Fault-Rupture Response Spectrum Analysis Procedure In Csibridge For Bridges Crossing Earthquake Fault Ruptures, Jennifer Evelyn Tures

Master's Theses

This thesis evaluates the application of a simplified analysis procedure as implemented in version 16 of CSiBridge^TM for design of bridges crossing earthquake fault ruptures. The fault-rupture response spectrum analysis (FR-RSA) approximation method has been proved adequate for both straight and curved ordinary bridges, but lacked a comfortable interface to accommodate the method users. Computers and Structure, Inc. has implemented the FR-RSA procedure into CSiBridge^TM, a user-friendly integrated 3-D bridge design software, as an added seismic design feature. By combining the response of the bridge due to the quasi-static displacement from the fault strike-slip rupture and the …

Structural Health Monitoring Of A Bridge Structure Using Wireless Sensor Network, Cheekian Teng

Masters Theses

Bridge Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) has rapidly become one of the main interests in civil engineering field. Inexpensive and efficient SHM method utilizing Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) is helping to facilitate the selection of the bridges that require maintenance. The changes to structural properties (i.e. stiffness) caused by damage (i.e. corrosion) will change the structural responses (i.e. acceleration responses) to ambient motions. Modal analysis algorithms applied to the vibration responses acquired through WSN provide the modal properties (i.e. natural frequency, modal shape and damping ratio) that will change with the changes in stiffness indicating possible existence of damage. Three output-only …

Estimating Characteristic Bridge Loads On A Non-Primary Road Network, Eugene J. Obrien, Bernard Enright, Brendan Williams, Cathal Leahy

Conference papers

When collecting truck loading data on a primary road network a common approach is to install a large network of permanent pavement-based Weigh-In-Motion systems. An alternative to this approach would be to use one or more portable Bridge Weigh-In-Motion systems which could be moved between bridges at regular intervals to determine the traffic loading throughout the network. A data collection strategy is needed to put such a system to best use. This paper details the data collection strategies which were examined for the National Roads Authority in Ireland. The use of urban economic concepts including Central Place Theory are discussed …

The Effect Of Clusters Within Crowds Of Pedestrians On The Vertical Response Of A Flexible Footbridge, Joe Keogh, Colin C. Caprani, Paul Archbold, Paul Fanning

Conference papers

The issue of excessive vibrations of footbridges due to the passage of pedestrians has been well documented in the past decade. Despite this there still remains great uncertainty as to how to predict the acceleration response of a footbridge due to crowd loading. This paper investigates the vibration response of a flexible footbridge subjected to crowd loading. Using a statistical model which caters for the variability of pedestrians, the vibration response of the footbridge is obtained. In this work, the effect of social groups or clusters of pedestrians in a crowd is investigated. Herein a cluster is defined as two …

Monte Carlo Simulation Of Extreme Traffic Loading On Short And Medium Span Bridges, Bernard Enright, Eugene J. Obrien

Articles

The accurate estimation of site-specific lifetime extreme traffic load effects is an important element in the cost-effective assessment of bridges. A common approach is to use statistical distributions derived from weigh-in-motion measurements as the basis for Monte Carlo simulation of traffic loading. However, results are highly sensitive to the assumptions made, not just with regard to vehicle weights but also to axle configurations and gaps between vehicles. This paper presents a comprehensive model for Monte Carlo simulation of bridge loading for free-flowing traffic, and shows how the model matches results from measurements on five European highways. The model has been …

The Response Of A Footbridge To Pedestrians Carrying Additional Mass, Darragh O'Sullivan, Colin Caprani, Joe Keogh

Conference papers

Footbridges with low natural frequency are susceptible to excessive vibration serviceability problems if the pedestrian pacing frequency matches the bridge natural frequency. Much research has been done into describing the response of a footbridge to single pedestrian loading. However, many pedestrians carry additional mass such as shopping bags and backpacks, and this has generally not been accounted for in previous research. This work examines this problem using an experimental bridge excited with many single pedestrian events, both with and without additional mass. The vertical acceleration response is measured and compared to moving force, moving mass, and moving spring-mass-damper models. The …

Portable Bridge Wim Data Collection Strategy For Secondary Roads, Bernard Enright, Cathal Leahy, Eugene J. Obrien, Jennifer Keenahan

Conference papers

A common method of collecting traffic loading data across a large road network is to use a network of permanent pavement-based WIM systems. An alternative is to use one or more portable Bridge Weigh-In-Motion systems which are moved periodically between bridges on the network. To make optimum use of such a system, a suitable data collection strategy is needed to choose locations for the system. This paper describes a number of possible strategies which the authors have investigated for the National Roads Authority in Ireland. The different strategies are examined and their advantages and disadvantages compared. Their effectiveness at detecting …

A Proposed Data Qualification Procedure For The Connecticut Bridge Monitoring Network, Stephen R. Prusaczyk

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

Modeling Same-Direction Two-Lane Traffic For Bridge Loading, Eugene J. Obrien, Bernard Enright

Articles

Many highway bridges carry traffic in two same-direction lanes, and modeling the traffic loading on such bridges has been the subject of numerous studies. Different assumptions have been used to model multiple-presence loading events, particularly those featuring one truck in each lane. Using a database of weigh-in-motion measurements collected at two European sites for over 1 million trucks, this paper examines the relationships between adjacent vehicles in both lanes in terms of vehicle weights, speeds and inter-vehicle gaps. It is shown that there are various patterns of correlation, some of which are significant for bridge loading. A novel approach to …

Modeling Extreme Traffic Loading On Bridges Using Kernel Density Estimators, Cathal Leahy, Eugene J. Obrien, Bernard Enright

Conference papers

Kernel density estimators are a non-parametric method of estimating the probability density function of sample data. In this paper, the method is applied to find characteristic maximum daily truck weights on highway bridges. The results are then compared with the conventional approach

Simulation Of Traffic Loading On Highway Bridges, Bernard Enright

Other resources

This work is based on weigh-in-motion measurements for approximately three million trucks obtained from sites in five European countries. Techniques have been developed, supported by photographic evidence, for filtering the measurements to identify and remove unreliable values, and for the classification of extremely heavy vehicles. The collected measurements have been used as the basis for building and calibrating a Monte Carlo simulation model for bridge loading. Two-lane traffic is simulated – either two lanes in the same direction or one lane in each direction. The model allows for vehicles that are both heavier and have more axles than in the …

Site Specific Modelling Of Traffic Loading On Highway Bridges, Bernard Enright, Eugene J. Obrien

Conference papers

Accurate traffic loading models based on measured weigh-in-motion (WIM) data are essential for the accurate assessment of existing bridges. Much work has been published on the Monte Carlo simulation of single lanes of heavy vehicle traffic, and this can easily be extended to model the loading on bridges with two streams of traffic in opposing directions. However, a typical highway bridge will have multiple lanes in the same direction, and various types of correlation are evident in measured traffic, such as groups of very heavy vehicles travelling together and heavy vehicles being overtaken by lighter ones. These traffic patterns affect …

Characteristic Dynamic Increment For Extreme Traffic Loading Events On Short And Medium Span Highway Bridges, Eugene J. Obrien, Daniel Cantero, Bernard Enright, Arturo González

Articles

More accurate assessment of safety can prevent unnecessary repair or replacement of existing bridges which in turn can result in great cost savings at network level. The allowance for dynamics is a significant component of traffic loading in many bridges and is often unnecessarily conservative. Critical traffic loading scenarios are considered in this paper with a model that allows for vehicle-bridge interaction and takes into account the road surface condition. Characteristic dynamic allowance values are presented for the assessment of mid-span bending moment in a wide range of short to medium span bridges for bi-directional traffic.

Importance Of The Tail In Truck Weight Modeling For Bridge Assessment, Eugene J. Obrien, Bernard Enright, Abraham Getachew

Articles

To predict characteristic extreme traffic load effects, simulations are sometimes performed of bridge loading events. To generalize the truck weight data, statistical distributions are fitted to histograms of weight measurements. This paper is based on extensive WIM measurements from two European sites and shows the sensitivity of the characteristic traffic load effects to the fitting process. A semi-parametric fitting procedure is proposed: direct use of the measured histogram where there are sufficient data for this to be reliable and parametric fitting to a statistical distribution in the tail region where there are less data. Calculated characteristic load effects are shown …

The Influence Of Correlation On The Extreme Traffic Loading Of Bridges, Eugene J. Obrien, Bernard Enright, A. T. Dempsey

Conference papers

Accurate traffic loading models based on measured data are essential for the accurate assessment of existing bridges. There are well-established methods for the Monte Carlo simulation of single lanes of traffic, and this can easily be extended to model the loading on bridges with two independent streams of traffic in opposing directions. However, a typical highway bridge will have multiple lanes in the same direction, and various types of correlation are evident in measured traffic. This paper analyses traffic patterns using multi-lane WIM data collected at two European sites. It describes an approach to the Monte Carlo simulation of this …

Management Strategies For Special Permit Vehicles For Bridge Loading, Bernard Enright, Eugene J. Obrien

Conference papers

An examination of weigh-in-motion data collected recently at sites in five European countries has shown that vehicles with weights well in excess of the normal legal limits are found on a daily basis. These vehicles would be expected to have permits issued by the responsible authorities. It can be seen from the measurements that most of them are travelling at normal speeds. Photographic evidence indicates that, while many are accompanied by an escort vehicle, normal traffic is flowing alongside in other lanes. As European freight volume grows, the frequency of these special vehicles can be expected to increase. Hence, the …

A New Congested Traffic Load Model For Highway Bridges, Colin C. Caprani, Colm Carey, Bernard Enright

Conference papers

Long span highway bridges are critical components of any nation’s infrastructure. Therefore accurate assessment of highway bridge loading is essential, and it is well known that congested traffic governs load effect for such bridges. Current congestion models use conservative assumptions about traffic and inter-vehicle gaps. This research investigates congested traffic flow through the use of traffic microsimulation which has the ability to reproduce complex traffic phenomena based on driver interactions. A time series model has been developed to produce a speed time-series similar to the results of the microsimulation. The speed time-series from the new model, combined with the established …

Strengthening Of Rural Bridges Using Rapid-Installation Frp Technology: Route 63 Bridge No. H356, Phelps County, Dongming Yan, Jianbo Li, Chenglin Wu, Genda Chen

Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

This report presents the use of externally bonded fiber reinforced polymers (FRP) laminates for the flexural strengthening of a concrete bridge. The bridge selected for this project is a two-span simply supported reinforced concrete slab with no transverse steel reinforcement located in Phelps County, MO. The original construction combined with the presence of very rigid parapets caused the formation of a 1-inch wide longitudinal crack, which resulted in the slab to behave as two separate elements. The structural behavior was verified using a finite element model (FEM) of the bridge. The bridge analysis was performed for maximum loads determined in …

Augusta Me: The New Bridge Begets A New Planned Neighborhood, Molly Pulsifer, Richard Barringer

Planning

Construction of a new Third Bridge over the Kennebec River in Augusta offered the prospect of a new and handsome gateway to the city. Further, the resulting change in traffic patterns offered the City the chance to plan for a pattern of development quite different from what the city had experienced for the past half-century. The case study describes the planning and construction of the new bridge and corridors that re-routed traffic out of Augusta’s downtown and older neighborhoods, and created the opportunity for planned development adjacent to the corridor created by the new bridge. It goes on to describe …

Study Of Same-Lane And Inter-Lane Gvw Correlation, Bernard Enright, Eugene J. O'Brien, Colin C. Caprani

Conference papers

The methodology used is to generate a number of years of simulated traffic and to use extreme value statistics to predict more accurately the characteristic loading for a given bridge. The parameters and probability distributions used in the Monte Carlo simulation must be based on observed sample traffic data. Some previous studies have made unsubstantiated assumptions regarding correlation between the Gross Vehicle Weights (GVW) of trucks in the same lane, or between trucks in adjacent, same-direction lanes. For this paper, an extensive database of Dutch Weigh-in-Motion data is analysed. Data are collected from two same-direction lanes and are time-stamped to …

Destructive And Non-Destructive Testing Of Bridge J857 Phelps County, Missouri : Feasibility Study On Damage Detection Of Rc Structures Using Dynamic Signature Tests, Genda Chen, Xinbao Yang, Huimin Mu, Antonio Nanni

Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

This report presents the results of a research program aimed at investigating the constructability and effectiveness of externally bonded FRP strengthening systems for improving the flexural capacity of bridge decks and piers. The joint effort of two universities, industry, and a state DOT provided the premise for a successful outcome. Bridge J857 was constructed in 1932 and was scheduled for demolition in the fall of 1998 due to highway realignment. Two of the three solid reinforced concrete (RC) decks were strengthened using two FRP systems namely, near-surface mounted carbon FRP (CFRP) rods and surface bonded CFRP sheets. Bridge decks were …