CEE Seminar: Performance Monitoring on Long-span Bridges

Abstract: Long-span bridges are one of the most important infrastructures in the transportation system. The importance of operating condition, namely the safety, durability and serviceability of existing long-span bridges, has drawn the attention of bridge management authorities and engineers. The management and maintenance of these infrastructures gradually become societal concerns. Many long-span bridges, including old ones and newly constructed ones, have installed Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) systems to provide information for structural maintenance. It was expected that this new technology could automatically, quantitatively identify structural damage and evaluate conditions of operating bridges for management decision making. Managing bridge maintenance based on SHM, however, is still facing many issues. This presentation reports on the recent development and challenges of long-span bridge maintenance especially in China. Following a brief review on the implementation experience of the SHM system for recent long-span bridge projects, the paper enumerates the technical challenges for bridge performance monitoring, as well as the R&D in progress.

Bio: Limin Sun received a bachelor's degree in civil engineering from Tsinghua University, Beijing, China, in 1985 and a master's degree in 1988 and doctorate in 1991 in civil engineering from University of Tokyo, Japan. He obtained his PE license (USA) in 1997. He worked as a research engineer at the Technical Research Institute, Obayashi Corporation, Japan, from 1992-2000. He currently serves as the director, professor and chair of the Bridge Engineering Department in Tongji University, China, and as an IAS adjunct professor in Yokohama National University in Japan. His research interests are in the areas of bridge engineering, and in particular, vibration control of bridge structures, health monitoring of large-span bridges, and nonlinear seismic response of RC bridges. He is the vice president of IABSE and a member of ASCE and CCES (China Civil Engineering Society).