A very good seminar. Valuable information for all engineers involved in bridge inspection, rating and rehabilitation. William A. Parks, Chief of Structural & Track Engineering, Maryland Transit Authority, Baltimore, MD

Purpose and Background

With rapid aging of the national transportation infrastructures, transportation agencies are spending more and more money on bridge rehabilitation. Currently, most states spend more money on bridge replacements and rehabilitations than building new bridges. This trend will certainly continue.

Bridge rehabilitation design differs from new bridge design in many ways. It requires a very high degree of knowledge and skills in structure condition evaluation, structural analysis, application of new materials, maintenance of traffic (staged construction), construction methods, and project lifecycle cost analysis. All of these are project specific, and require sound judgment to develop the best design alternative. Because of the complexity, most universities do not offer undergraduate or graduate courses on this subject.

This two-day seminar will discuss essential bridge rehabilitation topics, including: structure condition evaluation, bridge load rating calculations, load testing and health monitoring, fatigue life analysis and repairs, rehabilitation techniques, new material applications, seismic retrofit, and decision models.

Seminar Benefits

• Gain an understanding of overall bridge rehabilitation procedures
• Learn existing bridge condition evaluation and Bridge Management System (BMS)
• Learn decision-making models
• Learn state-of-the-art bridge rehabilitation techniques

Learning Outcomes

Upon completion of this seminar, you will be able to:

• Conduct or supervise bridge inspections for bridge rehabilitation projects.
• Perform a bridge load rating analysis per AASHTO The Manual for Bridge Evaluation or using load test and finite element analysis
• Predict remaining fatigue life, and perform fatigue damage repairs
• Use decision making tools to select the best bridge rehabilitation alternative
• Perform a detailed bridge rehabilitation design using materials and new techniques

Assessment of Learning Outcomes

Two real-world case studies will be assigned. Students will apply the newly learned knowledge, skills and tools to efficiently solve the problems.

Who Should Attend?

Structural engineers and bridge designers, project managers, bridge owners, transportation policy or decision makers, and other bridge engineering professionals will benefit from this seminar.

Summary Outline

TIME: 8:30 a.m. - 4:30 p.m.

DAY 1

• Define seminar objective
• Brief review of bridge rehabilitation procedures
• Introduction of bridge inspections and Bridge Management System
• Load rating
• Fatigue remaining life calculation and fatigue damage repairs
• Load testing and structure health monitoring
• Bridge inspection and rehabilitation

DAY 2

• New materials and techniques for bridge rehabilitations
• Decision models

Case Studies

• Case study 1 - Castlewood Canyon Bridge Rehabilitation, Douglas County, Colorado
• Case study 2 - Kanawha River Bridge Replacement / Rehabilitation Project, Charleston, West Virginia