The Italian infrastructural asset, mainly consisting of RC bridges, is affected by sig-nificant obsolescence: many bridges overpassed their theoretical nominal life and did not experience any maintenance intervention. Such a critical scenario is even worse if it is additionally considered the increase of vehicular traffic that occurred in the last decades. From a management point of view, many structures needed re-strictions on use due to their inadequacy to withstand the traffic load provided by the current codes. This is a direct consequence of accurate safety assessments of such structures. In this paper, the opportunity to adopt nonlinear analyses for the safety assessment of existing RC bridges is discussed. The safety-format proposed in EuroCode 2 for designing new RC bridges and based on nonlinear analysis meth-odology is critically reviewed to consider its possible application to existing bridges. Then, the estimation of modelling uncertainty is proposed to define some ac-ceptance criteria for the specific numerical solution strategy to be used, following the most recent international research outputs. Finally, a case study is addressed with the aim to compare linear and nonlinear results, the latter based on a calibra-tion and verification of the adopted modelling strategy.
Nonlinear analysis procedures for safety assessment of existing RC bridges under traffic loads
De Matteis, Gianfranco;Mattei, Francesca;Caprili, Silvia;Dall'Asta, Andrea;Salvatore, Walter
2023-01-01
Abstract
The Italian infrastructural asset, mainly consisting of RC bridges, is affected by sig-nificant obsolescence: many bridges overpassed their theoretical nominal life and did not experience any maintenance intervention. Such a critical scenario is even worse if it is additionally considered the increase of vehicular traffic that occurred in the last decades. From a management point of view, many structures needed re-strictions on use due to their inadequacy to withstand the traffic load provided by the current codes. This is a direct consequence of accurate safety assessments of such structures. In this paper, the opportunity to adopt nonlinear analyses for the safety assessment of existing RC bridges is discussed. The safety-format proposed in EuroCode 2 for designing new RC bridges and based on nonlinear analysis meth-odology is critically reviewed to consider its possible application to existing bridges. Then, the estimation of modelling uncertainty is proposed to define some ac-ceptance criteria for the specific numerical solution strategy to be used, following the most recent international research outputs. Finally, a case study is addressed with the aim to compare linear and nonlinear results, the latter based on a calibra-tion and verification of the adopted modelling strategy.I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
