A Research On Adaptability Of Present Highway Bridge Vehicle Design Load

As China's economic development, more and more heavy trucks are driving on the road. Because overload control is not timely and policies are not yet perfect, effects of overload control are not satisfactory. Overload is a grave threat to bridge safety and it causes bridge diseases, reduces bridge life expectancy, even causes bridge collapse. All of these resulting in the loss of people's lives and state property. Therefore, the research on adaptability of present highway bridge vehicle design load is needed to service the revision of the standard.First, this paper conducts a survey of domestic heavy-duty vehicles and gives the typical design parameters of heavy-duty vehicles. It introduces overload policy, loading based toll collection, the axle load limits and the total mass limits of some countries. The history of Chinese highway bridge vehicle design load, the American and the European bridge vehicle design load are listed in the paper.Second, based on the weigh-in-motion data of Guangzhou-Shenzhen Highway,107 State Road and Humen Bridge East Approach, traffic characteristics of the measuring points are analyzed. Basing on the axle load, total weight, wheelbase, vehicle spacing, vehicle speed and other data, using Monte Carlo method and using Matlab programming different span simply supported beams and continuous beams' program to calculate moment and shear forces comparing with the bridge design vehicle load. The vehical load effects of Qilangwo Bridge are measured to research on the adaptability of its vehicle design load.Thirdly, the gross vehicle weight and axle load of the three measuring points are adjusted to simulate the vehicle load under strict load control and load effects are calculated for different load control levels to seek reasonable load limit of vehicles.Finally, the influence of loading based toll collection are studied by simulating the vehicle weight under the situation. Also,the vehical effect of the Xihoumen Bridge is calculated under the rule of loading based toll collection.This study is not only helps understanding the characteristics of the vehicles on highway bridges and the current design level of vehicle load. But also provides evidence to modify highway bridge design vehicle load and formulating the existing highway bridge design vehicle load limit.