Lifecycle management of footbridges: a framework

Abstract

Little effort has been made to develop a life-cycle management system for small or medium-scale projects, such as the provision of footbridges. As the number of footbridges keeps increasing, there is a need to develop an optimal management strategy to optimise the cost of design and construction, as well as the cost of future actions such as maintenance, inspection and repair. However, while footbridges tend to be built in the form of networks, in most existing life-cycle management system research and practice, bridges are treated individually rather than as a bridge network. A new life-cycle management system for footbridges is therefore needed. The objective of this paper is to propose a framework for a life-cycle management system of footbridges which consists of three management levels – component level, project level and network level – in order to manage footbridges as a united network. The management approach and the dominant components of the proposed framework are introduced and application of the framework to Hong Kong provides an illustrative example.