Dynamic Characteristics Evaluation of Innovative UHPC Pedestrian Cable Stayed Bridge

Abstract

KICT (Korea Institute of Construction Technology) is conducting a project called “SUPER BRIDGE 200—Development of Low Cost and Long Life Hybrid Cable Stayed Bridge”. This project aims to reduce the construction and main- tenance costs of long-span bridges by 20% and double their lifetime through the exploitation of ultra-high performance concrete (UHPC). This paper presents the design and construction of the first pedestrian cable stayed bridge using UHPC developed by KICT. UHPC, compared to conventional concrete, has not only high compressive and tensile strengths but also high ductility. The UHPC developed at KICT is a steel fiber-reinforced cement compound presenting design compressive strength larger than 180 MPa and design tensile strength exceeding 10 MPa with water-to-binder ratio below 0.24 and admixing of 2 volume percentage of steel fiber. To show the applicability of UHPC to structures, a pedestrian cable stayed bridge (Super Bridge I) exploiting the characteristics of the developed UHPC has been planned, designed and erected at KICT. The dimension of UHPC deck is 2.7 m × 7 m as a precast segment with a typical thickness of deck of only 7 cm. However, harmful crack was observed in the deck at the time of the fabrication of the deck segments. Accordingly, new fabrication method was conceived and applied to prevent cracking of the UHPC slender deck. Four UHPC deck segments were fabricated successfully without any crack. After construction, the dynamic characteristics (natural frequencies and mode shapes) were evaluated through vibration tests since several users felt excess vibration. A vertical tuned mass damper (TMD) was proposed and installed on the parapet of the bridge. The TMD reduces the acceleration by about 30% from 0.0316 g to 0.0244 g when two pedestrians are crossing the bridge.