Refinement and Validation of the Minimal Information Data-Modelling (MID) Method for Bridge Management

Abstract

Various approaches have been proposed for bridge structural health monitoring. One of the earliest approaches proposed was tracking a bridge’s natural frequency over time to look for abnormal shifts in frequency that might indicate a change in stiffness. However, bridge frequencies change naturally as the structure’s temperature changes. Data models can be used to overcome this problem by predicting normal changes to a structure’s natural frequency and comparing it to the historical normal behaviour of the bridge and, therefore, identifying abnormal behaviour. Most of the proposed data modelling work has been from long-span bridges where you generally have large datasets to work with. A more limited body of research has been conducted where there is a sparse amount of data, but even this has only been demonstrated on single bridges. Therefore, the novelty of this work is that it expands on previous work using sparse instrumentation across a network of bridges. The data collected from four in-operation bridges were used to validate data models and test the capabilities of the data models across a range of bridge types/sizes. The MID approach was found to be able to detect an average frequency shift of 0.021 Hz across all of the data models. The significance of this demonstration across different bridge types is the practical utility of these data models to be used across entire bridge networks, enabling accurate and informed decision making in bridge maintenance and management.