Institute for Transportation

About the research

• Develop an instrumented pile capable of monitoring the thermal and seismic behavior at a bridge foundation
• Deploy an instrumented pile under simulated field conditions
• Assess the effectiveness of the remote monitoring system for asset management

Abstract

A key challenge to managing fixed assets such as bridges and other transportation infrastructure is monitoring their condition over time. Under typical service conditions, deterioration resulting from traffic loading and difficult environmental conditions can result in a reduction or loss of service of a particular asset, or even life threatening and dangerous failures. Extreme events such as earthquakes and floods present a still greater challenge in that the service condition of the asset may change abruptly and without warning, leaving managers without key information they need to respond to the event. The goal of this project is to develop remote health monitoring technology that will provide managers and owners with timely information on the condition of civil infrastructure assets. This will be achieved through the development of an instrumented pile that will provide real-time data on bridge scour and seismic activity, allowing for the remote monitoring of bridge conditions by key managers and engineers.

Potential Benefits of the Project:

• Enable widespread remote monitoring of more than 26,000 scour critical bridges in the U.S.
• Provide foundation for remote health monitoring systems for culverts, tunnels and highway bridges in general

Funding Sources:
Midwest Transportation Consortium
Missouri Department of Transportation
University of Missouri – Columbia