CHAPTER 3

Track-bridge interaction problems in bridge design

A.M. Cutillas
Technical University of Madrid & Carlos Fernández Casado S.L., Madrid, Spain

ABSTRACT: Track-bridge interaction problems have a main role in the design of bridges,
especially at conception stage of long viaducts with high or short piers in high speed railways
lines.
The presentation will focus on the main aspects of track bridge interaction aspects to be taken
into account in the design of these bridges:
• Bridge displacement limitations at track level
• Railway expansion joint needs
Some examples of recent bridges which have been designed in High speed railway lines in Spain
will be shown. A special attention will be paid to the Viaduct over the Guadalete river. It is a
3221.70 m long viaduct in which the aforementioned problems were determinant in the conception
and design of the bridge.

1 TRACK-DECK INTERACTION PROBLEMS

Railway bridges, in general and high speed railway bridges in particular have to resist important
horizontal loads.The horizontal loads are originated by the climate such as the wind. The wind acts
on the whole structure surface exposed, the piers and the deck as well as on the live load itself.
These loads produce bending moments of the deck’s vertical axis as well as twisting moments
which are added to the combined pier-deck effects produced by the live load.
The live loads produces two horizontal loads derived from the accelerations. On the one hand,
transverse radial accelerations in curved layouts, which bring about the centrifugal force. On the
other hand they bring about longitudinal accelerations produced by braking and traction forces.
The stresses due to the centrifugal forces produce the same effects as those derived from the
transverse wind. These forces can be very important for even though the radii are great so is the
speed (Fig. 1).

Figure 1. Viaduct 2 in Substretch VIII.

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20 Track-Bridge Interaction on High-Speed Railways

The braking forces considered amount to 2 t/m according to EC-1, with a maximum application
length of 300 m. The traction forces, in their turn, equal 3,3 t/m with a maximum loaded length of
30 m. Consequently, for long viaducts (longer than 300 m) the maximum force transmitted to the
tracks will amount to 700 t. The force transmitted to the deck, bearings and piers will depend on
whether the expansion joints are arranged or not on the rail at one or both ends of the deck, as well
as on the total length (Fig. 2).
Within the whole made of the track (rail, sleepers, ballast), the deck, the bearings and the piers as
deformable elements with different mechanical properties there are force transferences produced
by external loads or deformations imposed, which bring about the well known phenomena of
track-deck interaction (Fig. 3).
When the rail is continuous and the track is supported on an element which is not very deformable
such as the ground, its sizing depends on the vertical and horizontal loads transmitted by the railway,
and the axial forces as a consequence of the deformations restrained by the temperature so the
strength reserve to failure is limited. When the tracks are placed over a structure, the imposed
deformations produced by the uniform temperature variations and by the creep and shrinkage
phenomena in the deck, produce relative displacements between the track and the deck that as a
consequence of friction forces with the ballast, produce horizontal loads over both the track and
the deck that may exhaust the resistant capacity of the rail. This is the reason why the arrangement

Figure 2. Bridge over the Ebro river.

Figure 3. Bridge over Contreras reservoir.

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 Track-bridge interaction problems in bridge design 21

of the continuous rail is limited to concrete structures with a total expansion length not greater
than 90 m.
With the intention to optimise the design and viaducts construction conditions and track exploita-
tion in continuous viaducts it will be necessary, whenever it is possible, to arrange an expansion
joint in one of the abutments. In this way the phenomena of track-deck interaction disappear. Oth-
erwise, the viaducts would have to be sub-divided into smaller lengths with the resulting problems
of structural joints, duplication of the bearings and the placing of intermediate stiff and resistant
elements in order to resist the horizontal loads in each structure.
If all these factors are studied and properly balanced: the resistant problem for horizontal forces
and the track-deck interaction problems, different longitudinal configurations of the viaducts can
be obtained (Fig. 4):

• Long continuous viaducts fixed at one abutment with one big expansion joint on the rail at the
opposite one (Figs 2–3, 5).
• Long continuous viaducts with a stiff intermediate pier and two small expansion joints on the
rail at both abutments (Fig. 1).
• Continuous viaducts with a stiff intermediate pier with no expansion joints in the rails (Fig. 6).

Most of the continuous viaducts we present here are longitudinally fixed in one abutment and
have one expansion joint in the rail in the opposite. Since all these viaducts are incrementally

Figure 4. Rail expansion joints. Longitudinal configuration.

Figure 5. Viaduct over Huerva river (L = 1122 m).

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22 Track-Bridge Interaction on High-Speed Railways

Figure 6. Bridge over Llobregat river in Martorell.

launched it is necessary to locate a segment casting yard on one of the abutments. These yards must
have the capacity, among other things, to resist the horizontal forces during the launching as well
as the loads produced by the wind and temperatures under rest conditions. These are, therefore,
elements able to be adapted to become anchorage elements of the deck under service conditions.
This is why most of the viaducts presented here, except the Viaduct 2 of the Sub-stretch VIII (Fig. 1)
and Martorell Viaduct (Fig. 6), are anchored in the abutment corresponding to the segment casting
yard. The abutment-yard whole is the structure in charge of transmitting to the ground the horizontal
forces produced by the braking and traction loads, the longitudinal wind and those produced by
friction forces of the elastomeric-teflon devices as a consequence of the deformations due to the
temperature, creep and shrinkage.
The total horizontal forces, under service conditions, are much greater than those corresponding
to the situation during construction for the following reasons:
During construction, the reactions in the supports produced by the horizontal forces correspond
to the total permanent load and not self weight.
The coefficient of friction of the teflon supports considered under service conditions amounts
to 5%, while during construction it amounts to 2.5%. Actually, the value of 2% is hardly reached
if special greases are used to reduce this coefficient.
Under service conditions we must take into account the braking and traction forces for viaducts
longer than 300 m reach a maximum value of 700 T.
In spite of the effectiveness of this structural disposition, we must bear in mind the fact that
the viaduct length imposes certain limits: on the one hand, the availability of expansion devices
able to admit great movements. At present, there are devices with the movement capacity of up
to 1200 mm, which establishes a length limit between 1200 and 1300 m for prestressed concrete
viaducts. On the other hand there is a limit, though higher than the previous one, which depends
on the capacity of the deck to admit the prestressing force that would counteract these horizontal
forces.
The concept of the Viaduct 2 of the sub-stretch VIII, mentioned before responds to the need to
reduce the movements in the expansion joint and to place the fixed point by a delta shaped pier on
a small hill in the valley. This disposition allows us to double the length of the viaducts by placing
two small expansion joints in the rail.
In MartorellViaduct and intermediateV shaped pier was designed. In order to resist the horizontal
forces and to reduce the longitudinal movements in this section, the pier is founded over slurry-walls
with a big longitudinal stiffness. (Fig. 6). The deck has a total length of 202 m, the expansion length
is 101 m (greater than 90 m). In order to avoid the expansion joints at the abutments a complete
track-deck interaction analysis was performed. The deck and rails were modelled connected with

© 2009 Taylor & Francis Group, London, UK

 Track-bridge interaction problems in bridge design 23

Figure 7. Track-deck interaction model.

Figure 8. Martorell bridge. Axial forces on the rail.

non linear springs corresponding to the mechanical behaviour of the ballast. The main conclusions
of the analysis were:
The stress increment in the rail due temperature actions was 42 MPa. (Fig. 8)
The maximum stress increment in the rail, in compression, due to temperature and braking-
traction forces was 77.6 MPa.
The longitudinal displacement in the deck due to braking-traction forces was 4.27 mm and
5.2 mm taking into account the foundation influence.
The braking force transferred to de deck is 80% of the total force applied at the rail level.

2 VIADUCT OVER THE GUADALETE RIVER IN SPAIN

2.1 Structural concept. General Description

The Viaduct over the Guadalete river is located in the railway line between Sevilla and Cádiz. It has
a total length of 3221.70 m. It is located in a circular alignment of 2200 m of radius. The average
height of the different piers is 10 m.
The viaduct crosses twice the Guadalete River and the roads CA 2011 and CA 9023. A bridge
which fulfils all the functional and structural requirements was designed from the beginning taken
into account the appearance suitable adapted to the landscape which is a very flat fertile valley.
(Fig. 9)
One of the most specific features of the bridge is the extremely length and the foundation
conditions. The soil has more than 25 m deep very soft layer. These soil conditions are inadequate
for resisting horizontal forces due to braking and traction railway loads.

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24 Track-Bridge Interaction on High-Speed Railways

Figure 9. Viaduct over the Guadalete river.

Figure 10. Viaduct over Guadalete river. Typical cross section.

The length of the viaduct asks for a typological study taken into account track-deck inter-
action problems due to imposed deformations, horizontal loads and to the position of the rail
and deck expansion joints along the viaduct. In this study different structural, constructional and
environmental problems were considered (Fig. 11).
From the structural point of view, the strength to resist the horizontal forces due to braking and
seismic loads should be compatible with the flexibility to reduce as much as possible the stresses
due to thermal and long term deformations. It was decided to avoid any expansion joint on the rails
in order to improve as much as possible the exploitation of the railway. A maximum length of 200 m
between structural deck expansion joints was limited in order to avoid any overstressing on the rails
due to track-deck interaction problems. In order to fulfill all the environmental requirements, the
supports over the river beds were reduced as much as possible. A precast solution was designed to
allow industrialized construction procedures suited to a very long viaduct (Fig. 12).
The final solution adopted is a twin precast box girder 2.20 m deep and located below each
railway axis, 2.15 m apart. The total deck width is 13.0 m (Fig. 10). This deck allows to span the
length of 30 m as a simply supported structure along most of the length of the bridge and to span
49 m with the help of two additional precast arches. This concept allows with a very repetitive
structure to cross the longest spans due to the presence of Guadalete river beds and the road CA

© 2009 Taylor & Francis Group, London, UK

 Track-bridge interaction problems in bridge design 25

Figure 11. Viaduct over Guadalete river. Simply supported girders.

Figure 12. Viaduct over Guadalete river. Precast arches.

2011. With these criteria the viaduct is split in 7 stretches with the lengths and spans shown in
Table 1. (Fig. 13)
The use of continuous precast arches allows to balance the horizontal forces due to permanent
loads on the intermediate supports creating a well suited and new structure (Fig. 14).

2.2 Track deck interaction problems

During the design conception the main idea of a jointless rail bridge has been present in order
to reduce maintenance problems. Two main aspects for track-deck interaction problems were
studied:
1. The structural scheme to resist the horizontal forces due to braking and traction railway loads.
2. The maximum displacements due to thermal and long term deformations to avoid overstresses
on the rails produced by track-deck interaction problems.
By these reasons the piers under simply supported girders are able to resist the horizontal loads
from each span and the expansion length of 30 m is far from producing any overstressing on the

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26 Track-Bridge Interaction on High-Speed Railways

Table 1. Viaduct over Guadalete river. Span distribution.

Stretch Length (m) N◦ Spans Span (m)

1 823.50 27 30.50
2 207.00 2 30.00
3 49.00
3 810.00 27 30.00
4 207.00 2 30.00
3 49.00
5 547.20 18 30.40
6 207.00 2 30.00
3 49.00
7 420.00 14 30.00
Total 3221.70 101

Figure 13. Viaduct over Guadalete river. Span distribution.

Figure 14. Viaduct over Guadalete river. Precast arches.

rails. For the greater spans the continuous precast arches are able to resist properly the horizontal
loads with an expansion length to avoid any overstressing problems on the rails.
Preliminary analysis to control track-deck interaction problems were performed: the expansion
lengths limitation were fulfil so the maximum displacement due to braking loads should be limited
to 5 mm at deck level on the structural deck expansion joints. These displacements were obtained
taken into account the flexibility of the soil-foundation structure using the stiffness matrix of the
whole. It was assumed that all the braking loads are transmitted to the continuous deck which can
be considered as an upper limit of the total load because of the continuity of the rails (Fig. 15).

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 Track-bridge interaction problems in bridge design 27

Figure 15. Displacement control under railway braking loads.

Figure 16. Track-deck interaction structural model.

Figure 17. Braking loads. Axial forces on the rail with soil structure-interaction model.

A detailed model for the track interaction problems was made in order to confirm the main
assumptions done in the preliminary analysis. The continuous precast arches were modelled with
plane bar elements. Four additional simply supported spans are added to avoid any perturbation
on the expansion joints results. The rails were included in the model as an additional structure.
The connection between the rail and the deck has been done with perfectly elastoplastic elements
which represent the track-deck behaviour, as it has been mentioned above. The maximum forces
and stiffnesses vary according the loaded or unloaded track situation (Fig. 16).
The different load cases were done in two different models:
1. Built-in model, in which the arches are completed built in the foundation
2. Model with soil-structure interaction: in which the soil-foundation stiffness matrix has been
included.
Three load cases have been considered on each model:

1. Case 1: Railway braking load at rail level.

2. Case 2: Deck increment of temperature −20◦ C.
3. Case 3: Deck increment of temperature +20◦ C.

The summary of the main results is as follows:

1. For the braking loads the soil structure stiffness has a relevant importance in the total
displacements and on the overstressing in the rails. (Figs 17–18)
2. For the thermal actions soil-structure interaction stiffness has no influence in the results.
(Figs 19–20)
3. The increment of stresses due to the combination of thermal actions and braking forces are lower
than the limits 72 MPa in compression and 92 MPa in tension.

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28 Track-Bridge Interaction on High-Speed Railways

Figure 18. Braking loads. Axial forces on the rail built-in model.

Figure 19. Thermal action +20◦ C on the deck. Axial forces on the rail with soil structure-interaction model.

Figure 20. Thermal action +20◦ C on the deck. Axial forces on the rail in built in model.

REFERENCES

ENV 1991-3:1995. Eurocode 1. Basis of design and actions on structures. Part 3. Traffic loads on bridges.
Manterola, J., Astiz, M.A., Martínez, A. Puentes de ferrocarril de alta velocidad Revista de Obras Públicas
n◦ 3386 pp. 43–77 Abril (1999).
Manterola Armisén, J.; Martínez Cutillas, A. Prestressed concrete railways bridges Workshop Bridges for high
speed railways. Oporto (2004).

© 2009 Taylor & Francis Group, London, UK