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Factors such as seismic risk, hydraulic vulnerability, and strategic importance are commonly used in an isolated fashion. However, these factors are relevant when there is no possibility to calibrate deterioration models. This research uses the needs-based framework for developing an integrated bridge index (IBI) as an aid for prioritization and decisions made on maintenance and rehabilitation of bridges. The index weighs the structure distresses, hydraulic vulnerability, seismic risk, and strategic importance of the bridge. The index was calibrated using visual inspection, survey to experts, and regression analysis. After, the index was applied on six bridges placed on a primary road of Chile. To organize visual inspection, bridge inventory, and compute IBI and rank bridges, a software was developed. The calibration of the IBI index shows a correlation of 98 and all the parameters obtained were significant. Further research is needed to integrate cost with the proposed index and allocate maintenance activities. Download full-text PDF Factors such as seismic risk, hydraulic vulnerability, and strategic importance are commonly used in an isolated fashion. This research uses the needs-based framework for developing an integrated bridge index. IBI ? as an aid for prioritization and decisions made on maintenance and rehabilitation of bridges. T o organize visual inspection, bridge inventory, and compute IBI and rank bridges, a software was developed. Author keywords: Bridge rating; Strategic importance; Vulnerability; Risk. Introduction Road networks are important to countries because they provide a continuous infrastructure that supports transport and economic systems. Ensuring a good connectivity and roads continuity are necessary structures for crossing topographic or anthropic ob- stacles with an adequate serviceability level. Particularly, bridges and viaducts are critical elements of road networks since their maintenance with a good quality level is expensive. https://absolute-siberia.com/userfiles/brother-mfc3220c-manual.xml

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This is due to the consequences of collapse imposing higher costs for users and local economies. The growth of traf?c and loads, variability of wind, seismic and hydraulic forces, and the natural deteriorations of constitutive materials of bridges tend to augment its vulnerability. Without adequate maintenance, the risk of collapse is higher over time, especially at the end of the service life of bridges. Due to the fact that the collapse of a bridge and the risk of fatalities are undesirable to the society, bridge engineering has developed tools for achieving acceptable conditions of bridge safety and functionality. These tools allow integrating assess- ments of bridge conditions; to make decisions about maintenance and plan the maintenance budget allocation over time in a road network or in a single bridge. The ?rst generation tools were focused on inventory, inspec- tion, and bridge rating. Modern tools use systems theory and the aid of mathematical and statistical tools for designing comprehen- sive maintenance plans at network and project levels. Bridge management systems. BMSs ? have been developed for this purpose. PONTIS and BRIDGIT in the United States, DANBRO in Denmark, and BRIME in the European Community are relevant examples. Austroads 2002 ?. Bridge Management in Chile In Chile, bridge maintenance is based on Highways Manual Guidelines. MOP 2008 ? and on recommendations of Carracedo ? 1994 ?. Also, local road and private agencies have developed con- ceptual frameworks for bridge maintenance and bridge inventory management systems. Echaveguren et al. 2000; de Solminihac 2001; Gattulli and Chiaramonte 2005; Chen and Johnston 1990; White et al. 1992 ?. The Highways Manual de?nes guidelines for bridge inven- tories and visual inspection in Chile. The recommendations of Carracedo ? 1994 ? describe methodologies for investment deci- sions on bridge maintenance based on social bene?ts. The bene? http://charletdesign.com/uploads/brother-mfc5440cn-printer-manual.xml

ts are determined considering road user costs and highways agency costs. Costs and bene?ts are estimated according to traf?c ?ow through each structure and its alternative routes. Echaveguren et al. 2000 ?. However, current Chilean practices for investment allocation on bridge maintenance are based on experiences of bridge engi- neers.Discussion period open until October 1, 2010; separate discussions must be submit- ted for individual papers.MOP 2008 ?. This procedure is currently applied only in principal highways. The inspection procedures used currently in Chile do not allow quantifying bridge conditions. The future evolution of structures and bridge hazards are not considered in maintenance decisions. In such a way, current national practice on bridge maintenance is not integrated and exhibits a lack of the most important compo- nents of a modern BMS. A national challenge to the country is moving toward modern BMS tools. Objectives and Research Methodology The objective of this research was to propose an index for a bridge rating in the context of a needs-based framework. The index, called integrated bridge index. IBI ?, was developed as an aid to prioritize bridges and suggest maintenance strategies at a network level. The basis of the research was to develop a tool that needs the minimum amount of data, is easy to use, and based on Chilean characteristics of the road network. Bridge Rating in the Context of BMSs Bride rating or scoring is a tool used in BMSs for prioritizing maintenance investments. Usually, BMSs adopt methods based on Eq. ? 1 ? to estimate the relevance of the bridges at the project or network level. The objective of Eq. ? 1 ? is to assign a number to each bridge to rank it according to its serviceability and relevance to the road network for prioritiz- ing maintenance activities. Other BMSs combine Eq. ? 1 ? with element deterioration mod- els and experts systems for de? http://www.drupalitalia.org/node/76640

ning decision trees and Markov chains for predicting the bridge ranking behavior over time. Kushida et al. 1997; Ryall 2001; Liu and Frangopol 2006; Hall- berg and Racutanu 2007 ?. This method has the objective of pre- dicting over time the most probable state of structures to make decisions about maintenance budget allocation. Generally, these types of methods are very expensive because of the need for a lot of data as inputs of sophisticated software. In contrast, needs-based methods are suitable for network level analysis, since it needs little information and few criteria or goals. These types of methods are an emerging alternative for integrat- ing ranking equations based on social, economical, structural, and safety criteria using multicriteria tools. Kulkarni et al. 2004 ?. Commonly, decision criteria are related to average daily traf- ?c, current bridge structural condition, weight and length of decks, load capacity, and clearance. Kurt 1988; W eyers et al. 1988; Harper et al. 1990; Shen and Grivas 1996; Kushida et al. 1997 ?. A good example is the BMS of The Netherlands, which con- siders decision criteria based on a bridge’s serviceability: acces- sibility, traf?c safety, environmental quality, comfort, aesthetics, and reduction of maintenance costs. Klatter et al. 2002 ?. Bridge Condition Concept The bridge condition re?ects the bridge damage level. It is esti- mated by means of visual inspection. It is expressed as the so- called bridge condition index. BCI ?? Blakelock et al. 1999 ?. The BCI explains the condition of the whole bridge from every ele- ment condition. An element condition is obtained with the aid of segmental visual inspection, in which distresses are identi?ed and rated. Distresses are estimated considering their magnitude and se- verity in every bridge element. Thereafter, the product of both parameters is weighed considering the relevance of each element in respect of bridge structural integrity. Eq. ? 2 ? illustrates the con- cept. http://garrisonjazz.com/images/bridge-construction-inspection-manual.pdf

Blakelock et al. 1999 ?. Vulnerability and Risk Concepts Vulnerability and risk concepts are widely used in building, urban planning, and recently, for assessing road networks performance. Berdica 2002; Taylor et al. 2006; Jenelius et al. 2006 ?. There exist some studies in the context of bridge management. For in- stance, Viera et al. ? 2000 ?, Lupoi et al. ? 2003 ?, Choi et al. ? 2004 ?, Mander et al. ? 2007 ?, and Zatar et al. ? 2008 ? have used risk con- cepts for the seismic vulnerability assessment of bridges and Fe- derico et al. ? 2003 ? for piers scour vulnerability assessment. The vulnerability concept does not have a single easy de?ni- tion. But for BMS purposes, the vulnerability can be de?ned ac- cording to Berdica ? 2002 ? as the susceptibility of a bridge to incidents that can result in a reduction or loss of serviceability, or in simple words, failure susceptibility.The vulnerability is similar to the reliability concept. The difference, according to Jenelius et al. ? 2006 ?, is that vulnerability is a concept oriented to the structure itself and reliability is oriented to users of the structure. The vulnerability is more related to the risk concept. The risk concept includes two components: the failure probability and its consequences. The failure probability is related to the forces that act over the structure induced by some type of incident. The con- sequences are user costs, social costs, and repairing or reconstruc- tion costs. For instance, in the context of seismic assessment, failure probability is related to seismic forces and the conse- quences are related to bridge damage. On a hydraulic assessment point of view, failure probability is related to ?ood recurrence intervals, which can induce scour, erosion, and narrowing of river channels; and the consequences are related to the damage that can affect piers, foundations, abutments, decks, and embankments of bridges. https://pikewallis.no/wp-content/plugins/formcraft/file-upload/server/content/files/16287367fa9ec3---cagiva-raptor-1000-manual.pdf

Both concepts, vulnerability and risk, can be estimated with practical approaches to be involved as decision criteria on BMS. Seismic Risk of Bridges The seismic risk. SR ? is de?ned as the expectancy of damage or the failure probability of a structure due to the demand and its capacity. The demand can be understood as the ground accelera- tion given earthquakes. It re?ects the consequences of the poten- tial damage on the bridge by action of earthquakes. Several methods exist to estimate SR. Fischer et al. ? 2002 ? estimated it by using the concept of structural damage as the difference between the current state of a structure and the control- ling collapse mechanism. Lupoi et al. ? 2003 ? de?ned SR in a general sense as the relation between the seismic hazard and bridge vulnerability. The seismic hazard is dependent on the geo- graphical location of a structure and seismic forces are obtained from ground acceleration, for practical purposes. Therefore, the structural vulnerability of a bridge is the structure propensity to suffer damage because of its structural design and con?guration ? Fischer et al. 2002 ?. Several writers highlight the need to include in the decision process of bridge maintenance the SR. Viera et al. 2000; Choi et al. 2004; Mander et al. 2007 ?, but little experience exists on the bridge management context. Small 2000 ?. Hydraulic Risk of Bridges Writers such as in the reference NY DOT ? 2003 ? use the concept of hydraulic vulnerability. HV ? to refer to hydraulic risk, most properly ?ood risk. The reference NY DOT ? 2003 ? de?ned hy- draulic risk as the probability that a part of the structure or the whole structure fails or presents serious damage due to hydraulic forces, given its con?guration, environmental characteristics, and level of maintenance of its elements. It is mainly dependent on river morphology and ?ow, materials of bed and banks, the char - acteristics of the structure, and clearance. NY DOT 2003 ?. BANGLENHOSPITAL.COM/UserFiles/File/component-identification-desk-reference-manual.pdf

Both characteristics permit to assess potential scour and the potential of bank erosion, which could weaken foundations, piers, abutments, and embankments. The structural and geometrical characteristics allow to esti- mate the probability that a ?ood compromises the bridge struc- tural integrity. The assessment of hydraulic risk mainly considers the likelihood of failure.IBI Proposed The IBI describes the relevance of a bridge as function of struc- ture condition, the bridge context in road networks, and natural risk factors that can affect bridge serviceability and road network continuity. The main factors selected for describing the IBI were strategic importance. SI ?, bridge condition, hydraulic risk, and SR. The selection of these factors obeys speci?c characteristics of Chile and its road network: the country has high seismic activity because of the movements of the Paci?c plate. Several mountain rivers move from the Andean mountains to the coast, crossing the territory and exhibiting high variability in the river step, morphol- ogy, stream speed, and water ?ow. Drastic weather changes exist over the year between winter and summer. Remarkable weather differences exist from south to north as well. In addition, the topology of the road network and the morphology of the Chilean territory impose strong restrictions to building road alternatives in coastal and Andean mountains. Procedure for Computing IBI The IBI is estimated by using Eq. ? 3 ?. The inputs are the SI, HV, SR, and BCI. The lowest value of IBI is 1, and the highest is 10. It permits to represent the effects of bridge placement in the road network for road users and national development strategies. Bridges located in road networks without alternatives routes, highly traf?cked, and located in farm areas have higher strategic relevance for the transport system. It is obtained directly from the road network and rated using T able 1; Table 1. {-Variable.fc_1_url-

Alternatives Routes Rating Type of detour Rating Description Parallel structure 1 There exists a structure nearby the bridge. It permits traf?c ?ow with low disruptions and delays. Parallel structure or road 2 There exists a structure nearby the bridge. It permits traf?c ?ow with congestion. There exist roads with a similar standard as alternative. The travel distance is similar. The time travel and road user costs do not change. Long detour 3 Alternative roads increase travel time and road user costs. Minor congestion is observed on the bridge. V ery long detour 4 An alternative road implies rerouting higher than 10 km of length. The standard of the alternatives is lower than the main route. High probability of congestion on the bridge. Without detours 5 There are no alternative routes.This type of visual inspection allows assessing the condition of river bed and banks, ?ow con- ditions, and scour level. Flow conditions are rated according to the probability of dam- age of the structure, considering that the ?ood may cover the desk. Scour is classi?ed as the vulnerability of the piers or abut- ments that suffer local or generalized scour. Once the rating of hydraulic state is done using ?ow conditions and scour, the lower of these two rates is selected. It is because the failure of structure can be produced by any of the two factors. SR Index The SR index is estimated according to the damage level modeled in each structure. The estimation is complex. For estimating the ground acceleration and structural response, a numerical model is needed. For instance, it can be used in Fischer’s method. Fischer et al. ? 2002 ??. The damage level obtained is associated to a se- mantic scale that explains the numerical rates of SR. The scale is show in T able 8. BCI The BCI is a quantitative index that represents the structure dam- age level according to the distresses observed in visual inspection. https://grupomarsamo.com/wp-content/plugins/formcraft/file-upload/server/content/files/1628736a65e08d---cagiva-parts-manual.pdf

Satisfactory 3 Two-lane bridge deck; narrow lanes produce passing restriction for heavy trucks. V ery satisfactory 5 Two or more lanes bridge deck; passing restriction does not exist. Table 5. Length of Bridge Rating Length range.L ? 50 2 Short 50 ? L ? 150 3 Regular 150 ? L ? 300 4 Long L ? 300 5 V ery long Table 6. Load Restriction Bridge Rating Type of restriction Rating Description Highly restricted 1 Passing is not allowed to heavy trucks; restricted passing for light vehicles. Medium restrictions 3 Passing is not allowed to heavy vehicles; passing is allowed to other vehicles.As a result, a record with the distresses for each bridge element is obtained. The element weight is de?ned for typical ele- ments of each type of bridge structure. The factor re?ects the material vulnerability, which ranges between 1.In both cases, the estimation was based on surveys to experts and meetings. In this section the procedures used to obtain Eqs. ? 3 ? and ? 4 ? are described. Calibration of IBI To calibrate the index a factorial design was developed. The fac- torial design considers 60 scenarios, which cover all the possible conditions of Chilean bridges. The scenarios were as follows. For BCI: excellent, good, regular, bad, and dangerous; for HV: high and low; for SR: high and low; and for SI: high, medium, and low. A subset of 20 scenarios was selected from all feasible com- binations of BCI, HV, SR, and SI. The scenarios were randomized and included on the survey. It was asked to experts for a rate between 1 and 10 for explaining IBI according to the levels of BCI, HV, SR, and SI. Before the calibration the consistency of the responses was analyzed. The survey was applied to 25 experts. Experts were selected considering their experience on research, road management, bridge design and construction, bridge hydrau- lic, bridge maintenance, and bridge inspection. A rule to eliminate the sample outlier responses was estab- lished. BANGKOKSOLARPOWER.COM/syner_upload/images/files/component-based-technology-lab-manual.pdf

The acceptance range for responses was the mean value of each response plus.When the rule was applied three outlier responses were obtained and erased from the sample. Based on representative values of each scenario depicted in the experimental design, a mathematical model for predicting BI was developed. The model was estimated using the sequential least- squares method. Eq. ? 6 ? shows the model calibrated. It implies that the calibration coef?cients have statistical signi?- cance. The results of the analysis of variance. ANOV A ? show an F -value of 360.5. It implies that Eq. ? 6 ? exhibits a high statistical signi?cance. The Durbin-W atson statistic obtained was 1.76. It means that the hypothesis of linearity of the independent variables is accepted. Fig. 1 shows the validation developed.Experts were selected according to their experience in road management, social assessment of projects, hydraulic and structural design, and construction. Each expert was asked for what factor they consider relevant to estimate SI. A preliminary list was developed with 14 factors: traf?c, alterna- tives routes, length of the bridge, economic activity, deck width, passing loads, type of structure, restrictions to heavy traf?c, travel time saving, road hierarchy, importance of the road, communities connection, traf?c accidents, and residual service life. From this list, the ?rst six factors were selected. It was asked to another experts group for a ranking between 1 and 10 of the factors: alternative routes, traf?c, length and width of bridge, load passing restriction, and bridge importance for economic activity. Re- sponses were processed and outliers were erased. This is consistent with the expectations of researchers. After processing the data, weights for each factors were esti- mated. Case Study In order to apply the methodology six bridges of the Chilean primary road network were analyzed. A visual inspection and bridge inventory for performing the study were needed. Database software for data management and BCI was developed. The ?eld data collection consisted of a 5-day campaign that took place on May, 2008 on three primary roads. On each bridge the following ?eld activities were carried out: bridge inventory, segmented visual inspection of structures.Both inventory and inspection were developed according to the guidelines of MOP ? 2008 ?. Traf?c data were obtained from the national traf?c inven- tory of the Chilean Ministry of Public W orks. By using these data, the IBI was estimated with Eqs. ? 4 ?, ? 5 ?, and ? 7 ?. The results are shown in T able 11. Particularly, the inputs of T able 8 were estimated using commercial software package based on the methodology developed by Fischer et al. ? 2002 ?. The BCI values obtained in all bridges range between 2.3 and 4.6. Particularly, Bridge 4 has de?ciencies on primary elements that need repairing and eventually detailed studies to assess its load capacity. Conclusions This paper develops an index that includes in its conception the notion of vulnerability, risk, and strategic importance. It improves the current state of the practice, which considers bridge condition as the main criterion for rank bridges. This research includes on bridge management decision the concept of risk under the context of vulnerability of transport systems, in agreement with the cur- rent tendency to using multicriteria methods for maintenance de- cisions. The correlation obtained for IBI was 98 and all calibration parameters obtained were statistically signi?cant. It implies that for Chilean conditions, the index proposed has good predictive capabilities into the inference space in which it was calibrated. A key issue of the proposal is the visual inspection and inven- tory, not only on the structure, but also on the river and the road. It is very important to improve the current practices of the visual inspection in Chile, with the aid of computer platform and guide- lines that consider the river and road. With this consideration inputs for estimating the IBI will be more accurate. The index proposed can be applied on bridges, overpasses, or viaducts. In the last two cases, the IBI and SI must be recalibrated and the HV should not be considered. It is possible that the level of service of traf?c could be considered as a factor that explains the IBI in the last two cases. Table 1 1. Summary of Results Ranking Bridge Length.The viaducts are transport corridors, in which mobility, accessibility, and traf?c are relevant to explain its relevance in a road network. The main weakness of the index proposed is the complexity of the estimation of seismic risk. T o an adequate estimation of this index a seismic history and zoning is needed. Likewise, it is nec- essary for a computer model of the structures and in turn a bridge inventory. In Chile, a national database of bridges inventory and its repairs do not exist. Therefore, in most cases it is necessary for an intensive ?eld work for updating it. To elaborate the decision making process further research is necessary. Future research should be focused on decisional trees and should include strategies of maintenance, road user costs, and maintenance costs with or without budget restriction at the net- work level. Currently, the writers are working on a research that integrates the index described on this paper with maintenance costs. Acknowledgments The writers wish to thank the Ponti?cia Universidad Catolica de Chile where the Postdoctoral fellow within this paper was carried out.From the road agency perspective, the BMS includes two relevant variables for allocating the maintenance budget for bridges: the overall qualification of the bridges and the costs associated to maintenance strategies aimed at improving this overall qualification. Valenzuela et al. (2010) proposed a prioritization index (PI) for bridges, which considers the structural condition, the hydraulic vulnerability and the seismic risk, in addition to the importance of the bridge within the road network and the productive system. The PI of Valenzuela et al. (2010) allows technically prioritizing maintenance activities and strategies at the network level under a need-based framework... Valenzuela et al. (2010) proposed a prioritization index (PI) for bridges, which considers the structural condition, the hydraulic vulnerability and the seismic risk, in addition to the importance of the bridge within the road network and the productive system. The PI of Valenzuela et al. (2010) allows technically prioritizing maintenance activities and strategies at the network level under a need-based framework. However, on its own, it does not allow estimating and allocating costs to maintenance strategies... This work proposes a systematic method that integrates the priority index of Valenzuela et al. (2010) to the maintenance decisions and their associated costs. First, it discusses the application of priority indexes to bridge maintenance, including their advantages and limitations, emphasizing the work of Valenzuela et al. (2010).. Allocation of bridge maintenance costs based on prioritization indexes Article Full-text available Dec 2019 REV CONSTR Tomas Echaveguren Prioritization indexes (PI) are a need-based bridge maintenance approach, which allows making short-term maintenance decisions. They generally use just the bridge condition as an explanatory variable, therefore, prioritizing is easy to do. When these indexes are multidimensional, prioritization depends not just on the bridge conditions, but also on variables such as vulnerability and their strategic importance. This paper discusses a simple and direct procedure to allocate bridge maintenance costs by using a PI based on the bridge condition, their strategic importance and vulnerability. The procedure combines maintenance activities within the strategies of routine and preventive maintenance, repair, reinforcement, reconstruction or replacement. It includes the calculation of maintenance costs by maintenance activity and strategy, in order to integrate them in a cost matrix. The procedure is applied to a 24-m long bridge, whose infrastructure is made of concrete, steel beams and concrete deck. Unit costs of 60 maintenance activities were calculated, and a sensitivity analysis was carried out to establish the cost by linear meter in relation to PI explanatory variables. The cost was sensitive to bridge condition, their vulnerability, and relevance within the road network View Show abstract. Altre metodologie sono state sviluppate nel contesto nazionale, attraverso le quali e possibile, tramite indicatori sintetici rappresentativi dello stato di conservazione dell'opera, programmare le azioni di intervento (CIAS 2001), (Montepara et al. 2008), (Valenzuela et al. 2009 ), (Castorani et al. 2011. Tutti i metodi menzionati prevedono, generalmente, una procedura comune basata su ispezioni visive tese a valutare lo stato di conservazione delle strutture e la definizione dunque di opportune strategie di manutenzione ed intervento.. Rischio strutturale di ponti esistenti: considerazioni preliminari sullo scenario in provincia di Caserta Conference Paper Full-text available Sep 2019 Gianfranco De Matteis Pasquale Bencivenga Mattia Zizi Antonino Del Prete Per effetto degli ultimi eventi (ad es.La presente memoria intende fornire un contributo in relazione a tale aspetto, fornendo indicazioni e metodologie di valutazione per la classificazione dello stato di conservazione del patrimonio di ponti e viadotti esistenti. Inoltre, sulla scorta delle valutazioni preliminari effettuate, finalizzate alla sola classificazione dei manufatti, sono state eseguite visite ispettive su alcuni ponti opportunamente selezionati, con il fine di valutare stato di conservazione e criticita presenti. Nell'insieme, lo studio svolto consente di definire un primo scenario dello stato di rischio e di conservazione dei manufatti della Provincia di Caserta. View Show abstract. Two main aspects addressed herein are studied. First concerning parameters, which must be taken into account while creating the list of bridges with priority for repair or renovation. Second concerning proposition of algorithms for creating such list. A set of factors that affect this priority has been created; the three main ones were selected: technical condition factor, safety factor and the importance for the roads network factor. Three self-reliant algorithms of the ranking list creation are presented. This algorithm, engaging back-propagation multilayer artificial neural network, is implemented in the General Directorate for National Roads and Motorways in Poland and is applied as a supporting tool in managing road-engineering structures. Usually, the rates of bridges can be compared at project or network level and can consider both serviceability and relevance. It takes into account the vulnerability risk and strategic importance of each net component.. Assessment of RC Bridges integrity by means of low-cost investigations Article Full-text available Oct 2018 Flavio Stochino Maria Luisa Fadda Fausto Mistretta Infrastructure aging is an important problem nowadays, in particular for countries like Italy in which the main motorways were built 50 years ago. Huge budgets are necessary to keep infrastructure and bridges in service. In addition, the lack of a proper and timely maintenance, entails an increase of the deterioration and therefore higher costs of repair.