Case Study: Assessing the Structural Condition of Steel Bridges Using Terrestrial Laser Scanner (TLS)
Publication: Construction Research Congress 2022
ABSTRACT
Bridges and other infrastructure assets require periodic condition assessments. The recent Infrastructure Report Card prepared by the ASCE found the national grade for infrastructure remains at a D+. Most of the steel bridges built in the USA are old enough to require frequent inspection and maintenance. The bridge inspection is performed manually by completing a checklist to investigate the condition of the main elements of the bridge structure as well as the shape deformation and structural settlement. However, rarely bridge inspection is completed by constructing a 3D model of the existing structure. The increasing availability of terrestrial point cloud presents new opportunities for rapid, intuitive, and accurate bridge assessment. In this paper, we analyzed the condition of an existing steel bridge over eight months by scanning the bridge at different dates and constructing 3D point cloud models. Bridge main features were extracted from the 3D point cloud and analyzed for structural deformation, bending, and rust. We conducted a holistic unit analysis by comparing the three data sets using CloudCompare3D, an open source for point cloud, and mesh processing. The results showed the importance of constructing a 3D point cloud for a better inspection of the existing capital assets. However, the skills and computing requirement for completing 3D point cloud inspection requires a certain investment in staff training and technology by transportation agencies.
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Construction Research Congress 2022
Pages: 433 - 442
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Published online: Mar 7, 2022
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