TruBridges

Background

Existing bridges are reaching their expected service life; therefore, decisions regarding what to do with them must be made. Maintenance and replacement expenses for road and railway bridges are exceptionally high and expected to increase, so it becomes essential to accurately determine the actual capacity and safety levels of those bridges. The design of existing bridges was made under several conservative assumptions, which underestimates the system's reserve capacity. Adopting advanced modelling and analysis methods in bridge assessment practices is crucial for sustainability. Combining probabilistic-based reliability methods with non-linear finite element modelling can help to better predict failure probabilities and the reliability of those structures. Full-scale experiments can help eliminate some of the uncertainties regarding structural behaviour, and better probabilistic models can be obtained.

Aim and objectives

The aim of this project is to enhance sustainability by reducing costs of strengthening or replacing existing bridges, by improving predictions of their true capacity and remaining life.

The objective is to develop a better method for assessing bridge capacity by combining reliability-based and probabilistic assessments with finite element modelling, full-scale experiments, and structural health monitoring data.

Facts

Financer: Trafikverket, SBUF.

Timeline: Project started on 01-2021 and Project ends on 06-2025.

Principal Investigator: Gabriel Sas.

Team members: Silvia Sarmiento, Jaime González-Libreros, Thomas Blanksvärd.

Dissemination

1) An improved metamodel-based algorithm to assess reliability analysis of existing structures using FEM (2023). Sarmiento. S, Gonzalez-Libreros. J, Sas. G. https://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:ltu:diva-96315 External link.

2) Comparison and Joint evaluation of Importance, Redundancy and Robustness Indicators Applied to Aging Prestressed Concrete Bridges (2024). Sarmiento. S, Thöns. S, Sanabria Díaz. R, Björnsson. I, Gonzalez. J, Sas. G. https://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:ltu:diva-96314 External link.

3) Redundancy and Robustness Quantification of Bridge Systems based on Reliability and Risk Approaches (2023). Licentiate thesis, comprehensive summary. https://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:ltu:diva-96316 External link.

4) Validation of an Experimental Methodology for Measuring Concrete Fracture Energy in Existing Structures (2023). Sarmiento. S, González-Libreros. J, Elfgren. L, Andersson. E, Petersson. M, Sas. G. Part of: Lecture Notes in Civil Engineering, Springer Science and Business Media Deutschland GmbH, 2023. https://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:ltu:diva-99538 External link.

5) A Parametric Study of an old Concrete Trough Bridge using non-linear Finite Element analysis (2022). Sarmiento. S, Åkergren. D, Gustafsson. J, Gonzalez. J, Sas. G, Elfgren. L, et al. Part of: IABSE Symposium Prague 2022: Challenges for Existing and Oncoming Structures - Report, International Association for Bridge and Structural Engineering, s. 1652-1659, International Association for Bridge and Structural Engineering, 2022. https://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:ltu:diva-92196 External link.

6) A risk-based robustness evaluation of a prestressed concrete bridge (2022). Bridge Safety, Maintenance, Management, Life-Cycle, Resilience and Sustainability: Proceedings of the Eleventh International Conference on Bridge Maintenance, Safety and Management (IABMAS 2022), Barcelona, Spain, July 11-15, 2022, Taylor & Francis, 2022, s. 2045-2052. https://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:ltu:diva-104578 External link.

7)Metamodel-Based Reliability Assessment of Reinforced Concrete Beams Under Fatigue Loads 2021 Ingår i: Proceedings of the 1st Conference of the European Association on Quality Control of Bridges and Structures / [ed] Carlo Pellegrino, Flora Faleschini, Mariano Angelo Zanini, José C. Matos, Joan R. Casas, Alfred Strauss, Springer, 2021, Vol. 200, s. 84-92. https://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:ltu:diva-88683 External link.

8) Pressure Distribution Patterns Between the Ballast and the Concrete Slab in Railway Trough Bridges (2021). Proceedings of the 31st European Safety and Reliability Conference and (ESREL 2021), 2021, s. 1093-1100. https://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:ltu:diva-87408 External link.

9) Response Surface Method strategies coupled with NLFEA for structural reliability analysis of prestressed bridges (2021). IABSE Congress Ghent 2021: Structural Engineering for Future Societal Needs, International Association for Bridge and Structural Engineering (IABSE), 2021, s. 1813-1822. https://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:ltu:diva-87406 External link.