Bridgemon: Improved monitoring techniques for bridges

Many bridges in the world’s transport infrastructure are old and have deteriorated over time. The solution to this problem is to either repair or replace a bridge or to establish its safety and maintain it in service. It is generally very costly to repair or replace a bridge. With reduced maintenance budgets there is an increasing interest in maintaining these old bridges in service by using probabilistic methods to prove that they are safe. Bridge safety is assessed based on (i) the loading which it will experience in service and (ii) the resistance of the structure. Improved knowledge of loading and resistance allows a more accurate assessment of whether a bridge is safe to remain in service without the requirement for expensive repair or replacement strategies. BridgeMon is an EU-FP7 funded project which aims to improve current monitoring techniques for road and rail bridges. This will be done by developing improved methods of evaluating traffic loading on bridges and carrying out Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) to identify damage and assess their remaining resistance. Bridge Weigh-in-Motion (B-WIM) refers to the technique of using the measured response of a bridge to calculate the vehicle loads crossing it and is a useful tool in monitoring traffic loading on bridges. BridgeMon will improve the accuracy of current B-WIM technologies and develop the first B-WIM system for railways. It is also developing the concept of virtual monitoring, whereby sensors are used to calculate vehicle weights which are then used to calculate stress histories throughout the bridge. Results of testing of a rail B-WIM system on a bridge in Poland are presented. Results show that the system is capable of accurately calculating train weights.