Horizontal Thermal Movement of Curved Bridge Decks

The displacements of the boundaries of skewed and curved bridges resulting from temperature change of the bridge deck depend on the lateral support system of the superstructure. To avoid high internal stresses in a redundant lateral support system due to temperature change of the superstructure, and to predict the boundary displacements, a statically determinate lateral support system is proposed. Equations are derived to compute the boundary displacements for the determinate lateral support system and suggestions are made for a suitable arrangement of this system. The effect on the displacements is presented for two different lateral support systems. The use of a statically determinate lateral support system permits the computation of the temperature displacements and the lateral support forces of the superstructure for the correct design of bearings.