The impact of a PEER funded research project "Establishing Bridge Column Capacity Limit States through Modeling and Simulation" is highlighted below. The project Principal Investigator (PI) is Sashi K. Kunnath, Professor of Civil Engineering, UC Davis. The research team includes Jin Zhou, Graduate Student Researcher, UC Davis.
Download the Research Project Highlight which includes the abstract. (PDF)
Research Impact:
Project outcomes will enhance the capability of Caltrans to rapidly estimate damage to their bridge inventory following an earthquake to facilitate the planning, management and mobilization of emergency response. Highway bridges comprise a critical component of California’s infrastructure and transportation network. The deployment of emergency response following a major seismic event is essential to post-earthquake recovery. In addition to enhancing emergency response capabilities following an earthquake, the establishment of capacity limit states will complement ongoing Caltrans efforts to develop probabilistic seismic demand models for a range of bridge types and consequently support and enhance planning decisions at Caltrans for effective allocation of resources (such as prioritizing retrofit needs for deficient bridges) for improved seismic safety. It is acknowledged that the damage state of a bridge system can be controlled by other factors. However, Caltrans practice requires that inelastic action be limited to column elements and that the superstructure and foundation remain undamaged. Hence the development of column capacity limit states is an important first step in the enhancement of the Shakecast platform.
