Guideline for load and resistance assessment of existing European railway bridges

Paper in proceeding, 2007

Many of the European railway bridges are getting close to the end of their service life. At the same time the railway operators demand higher axle loads for freight trains and higher speeds for passenger trains. This requires new and better approaches for assessing both the railway loads and the resistance of railway bridges. The main objective of the "Guideline for load and resistance assessment of existing European railway bridges" is to provide bridge evaluators with the most advanced knowledge regarding methods, models and tools that can be used in the assessment of existing railway bridges in order to get a realistic evaluation of their load carrying capacity and also more accurate evaluation of their remaining service life. This paper gives the general overview of the whole Guideline. Nevertheless, the major focus is placed on the innovative elements proposed in the Guideline, which have been developed due to several research activities performed within WP4.