On the load-carrying capacity produced by different load models for road bridges

Abstract

The evaluation of existing bridges is an important process and source of information within the bridge management system. Except for the load-carrying capacity represents the basic evaluation parameter, it moreover expresses a relevant and decisive parameter for the transition of actual road traffic. The paper presents the continuation of an already published analytical study aimed at comparing the effects of traffic load produced by different load models on road bridges. There are presented calculated load-carrying capacities for model cases of bridges with an upper deck with eight alternative spans and six different cross-sectional arrangements. On each of them, multiple load models simulating the effects of traffic were considered, while a certain predefined part of the considered load represented the required weight of the vehicle defining the load-carrying capacity of the respective bridge. The discussion is mainly focused on the pitfalls and possibilities of correctly defining the dependence of the weight of the vehicle representing the load-carrying capacity from the traffic load consideration schemes themselves, which are mostly defined by design codes.