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Assignment in Ce 513 Bridge

This document discusses bridges, including their types, materials, construction process, and common reasons for failures. It provides details on beam, cantilever, arch, suspension, truss, and floating bridges. Common materials used in bridge building include steel, concrete, stone and asphalt. Bridge failures can result from a combination of issues like age, weather events, and unexpected loads. Major causes discussed are infrastructure problems, floods, and unexpected events during construction.

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Francis Prince Artiaga
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76 views4 pages

Assignment in Ce 513 Bridge

This document discusses bridges, including their types, materials, construction process, and common reasons for failures. It provides details on beam, cantilever, arch, suspension, truss, and floating bridges. Common materials used in bridge building include steel, concrete, stone and asphalt. Bridge failures can result from a combination of issues like age, weather events, and unexpected loads. Major causes discussed are infrastructure problems, floods, and unexpected events during construction.

Uploaded by

Francis Prince Artiaga
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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FRANCIS PRINCE S.

ARTIAGA BSCE-V

CE 513

Bridges

I.
Bridge

A bridge is a structure built to span a physical obstacle, such as a body of water, valley, or road,
without closing the way underneath. It is constructed for the purpose of providing passage over
the obstacle, usually something that is otherwise difficult or impossible to cross.

II. Types of Bridges

The bridge design determines how tension, compression, shear, and torsion are distributed on
the structure. The common bridges used are beam, cantilever, arch, suspension, truss, and
floating bridges. They are different from each other in the materials used, construction
techniques, shape, and span of the bridge.

 Beam bridges consist of reinforced steel girders that transfer the loads on the piers
located at each end,
 Cantilever bridge consists of two beams that are supported at one end only.
 Arch bridges are arch shaped with their weight being forced into the supports at each
end and with construction materials that are light and possess high tensile strength.
 Similarly, other bridges are constructed according to their requirements.

III. Equipment

1. Dragline Excavator
2. Bulldozers
3. Graders
4. Wheel Tractor Scraper

IV. Materials to build a bridge

Some of the main materials found on a bridge are steel, concrete, stone and asphalt. Other
materials include iron, timber, aluminum, rubber and other joint materials.

V. Bridge Building Process


1. Break Ground.
2. Compaction of Soil.
3. Pour Abutments.
4. Girder Placement.
5. Decking Plan.
6. Railings Installed.
7. Paint and Decor.
8. Testing.

VI. Common Reasons for Bridge Failures

1. A combination of issues

The top reason bridges fail is a mix of factors that, if they happened individually, would not
cause a bridge to collapse. However, when they take place all at once, they result in devastating
consequences. For example, severe winds may not be enough to cause a structure to come
down. However, when they hit a bridge that’s structurally too rigid to withstand them, it leads
to failure.

The I-
35W

Mississippi River Bridge in Minneapolis collapsed suddenly in August 2007. The official cause
was attributed to gusset plates that were too thin and tore along a line of rivets.
The issue: The plates had supported heavy traffic volume for 40 years. It took a secondary
factor, the additional weight of construction equipment parked on the bridge at the time, to
trigger the failure. Another contributor: Wear and tear on the gussets had not been identified
prior to construction starting because bridge inspections had been missed.

So, while the gussets were identified as the root cause of this devastating collapse, it was really
three separate factors coming together that led to disaster.

2. Infrastructure issues

According to the American Society of Civil Engineers, bridges in the United States earn a
mediocre C+ rating for maintenance and safety. The group reports that one out of every nine
bridges in the country is considered structurally deficient, and the average age of bridges in the
U.S. is more than 42 years old. The age and condition of bridges is a contributing factor to many
recent collapses.

One positive: Modern equipment makes it easier to inspect aging bridges to look for potential
structural issues.

The collapse of the I-5 Skagit River Bridge in 2013 is blamed on infrastructure-related problems.
An oversized load crossing the bridge was the immediate cause of the incident. However, many
weight restrictions had been placed on vehicles crossing the bridge because it had been
declared functionally obsolete. This designation means it did not have the redundant structures
and systems that would be required if the bridge were to be built today. The collapse could
have been avoided if the antiquated bridge had been reinforced or replaced sooner, leveraging
today’s safer standards.
3. Floods

Today’s changing climate and the extreme weather events associated with it are causing more
flood-related damage to bridges. Most of this damage isn’t from water alone. During a flood,
rivers pick up debris, such as trees and buildings, and push it forcefully against bridges, causing
their foundations to wash away and structural elements to break apart.

Most collapses happen on bridges that were built a long time ago when designers couldn’t
imagine the kind of storms they’d have to withstand today. This is an important lesson for
bridge designers. They must plan structures and drainage systems that can hold up against
today’s storms and potentially more extreme weather events in the future.

4. Unexpected events

When it comes to bridge construction, engineers simply don’t know what they don’t know.
Countless bridge incidents happen because of unanticipated structural or design-related issues.

The good news: Computer modeling and testing make it easier for engineers to see how
different bridge designs hold up against a broad range and combination of unexpected
conditions. Still, it’s important for them to build redundancies into structures to cover unknown
possibilities in today’s fast-changing world.

The Tsing Ma Bridge in Hong Kong is among the longest suspension bridges in the world. It’s
built on a site that experiences earthquakes, extreme winds, rough water, and typhoons. Prior
to being completed in 1997, it underwent significant scale model, wind tunnel, and computer
testing. This led to innovations that improved the design of this bridge and others that
followed.

5. Accidents

6. Construction incidents

Some bridges never make it to completion. They fail during construction. 

7. Design flaws and manufacturing errors

8. Fires

9. Earthquakes

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