Shifting qualitative approach in condition monitoring of bridge assets toward a quantitative approach

Abstract

Many existing transportation infrastructure assets such as bridges, overpasses, underpasses, causeways and culverts in developed metropolises are aging and health monitoring data is now becoming a critical aspect when it comes to evidence based maintenance budgeting. Such infrastructure assets are owned and managed through different authorities representing local, regional, state and national levels of governance. Even in the current practice, especially at local and regional level, condition monitoring is predominantly qualitative and as such labour intensive and assessment is subjective. This raises some questions with regard to the decision making processes in budgetary allocations. This paper presents an insight to the current process of qualitative condition monitoring, based on Australian practices, and the quantitative approach covers through a literature review. Advanced methods of real time condition monitoring using remote sensing are also discussed although such modern techniques are currently being limited to large, recently constructed bridges which are relatively young bridges.