A ‘low-damage’ alternative to earthquake-resistant bridge structures

Researchers in New Zealand have introduced a “low-damage” design as an alternative to earthquake-resistant bridges.

“The current earthquake design philosophy prevents bridge infrastructure from collapsing as a result of a large-scale earthquake, but this does not mean that bridges will not be significantly damaged,” said Alessandro Palermo, a professor at the University of Canterbury’s School of Engineering. On the project with civil engineering doctoral student and bridge planner Sabina Peras (both pictured above) and Associate Professor Gabriel Chiaro.

“Road closures and repairs can have a significant social and economic impact as seen in the Canterbury and Kaikoura earthquakes, bringing affected areas to a standstill and costing the economy millions,” he added.

The team has developed a solution that by combining self-centering swinging bridge poles can achieve large displacements with little or no damage compared to conventional bridge poles. The swing shaft consists of two main structural components: one or several high-strength bars that act like rubber bands to the last shaft, and several traditional steel bars that are detailed for energy dissipation and can be easily replaced if severely damaged.

“When an earthquake occurs, the shaft shakes the foundation. The joint in which the oscillation movement occurs is designed and articulated so that it can be easily repaired in a very short time,” says Byras. Repair work at the joint can take place over the course of one night, which prevents major disruption to traffic, she says, compared to current building methods that can take months or even years to repair or rebuild.

The work was inspired by the 2016 Kaikoura earthquake that had a major impact on the transportation network with damage, landslides and liquefaction affecting more than 900 bridges. After visiting Kaikōura, researchers understood the need to learn how low-damage rock solutions would perform in different soil conditions. “It’s like driving a Ferrari on the road or rough terrain; its performance will not be the same,” Palermo said.

The researchers investigated the effect of different soil types on the low-damage swing shaft system and developed a new, simplified test technique to simulate this complex problem.

“The soil on which we build our infrastructure varies a lot across New Zealand, and we must understand how additional soil movements in an earthquake affect the swaying behavior of our shafts,” Beras said.

“The majority of New Zealand bridges are built on single piles of large diameter, although large and solid, they are still subject to movements in an earthquake. Structural bridge researchers have validated the performance of low-damage vibrating bridge posts through pilot testing assuming that the foundations are stationary. However, we recognized that this incorrectly predicts system behavior, and we are the first to study the effect of soil, foundation and structure interaction on low-damage vibrating bridge shafts.”

According to the research team, the novelty of the solution lies in its simplicity in construction.

“I have worked on many different low-damage bridge systems and it appears that the main barrier to implementation has been the slightly higher cost and risks associated with this new design,” Palermo added. “I view the Wigram-Magdala Link Bridge in Christchurch as Tesla Bridges and would like to see more of these seismic solutions in action.”

The team said its research expands on previous projects and the application of post-tension swaying bridge columns but has focused on developing a cost-effective solution with the goal of getting clients, consultants and contractors to start adopting the approach more quickly.

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