When it comes to road and bridges safety, Pennsylvania has always been quick and alert. To boost this point, the Pennsylvania Highway Information Association (PHIA) and the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) acknowledge improvement projects on road safety and bridges.
They conduct this award along with several teams and organizations. Now, we will look at the project undertaken by Encardio-rite. The i78 bridge is a dual-road bridge that is located on Interstate 78 on Easton Road, near Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.
Importance of Bridge Monitoring and Risk Assessment
Geotechnical instruments and monitoring solutions are very important components in the construction of any structure. The simple reason is that these instruments and sensors help in assessing the deficiencies and damages borne by a structure.
It has been reported that the estimated average annual bridge collapse rate in the United States is somewhere between 87 to 222. This makes an average amount of 128 bridge collapses per year.
Several hundred and thousands of lives have been lost over the years. It has become necessary to assess the risk and monitor the performance of any structure before any more lives are lost.
I-78 Toll Bridge – Project Overview
The project timeline is of the year 2020-2021. The project task was regarding the rehabilitation of the I-78 dual road bridge located in Bethlehem. The i78 Easton Road Bridge Abutment Project was built in 1984 and was installed on the muddy site. This was the reason that made it difficult to clear the boreholes of the installations out. Apart from that, there was a bigger issue of the gap created between the i78 bridge and MSE walls.
Project Complications
As mentioned above, the main complication regarding the i78 bridge on Easton Road was the opening and clearing of the boreholes. In the difficult circumstances of the site, it was quite difficult to install any sensors or instruments.
The boreholes were very muddy and as a result, it was quite a challenge to install any monitoring instruments. We had to install a special traffic-rated utility vault and ABS boxes as the i78 bridge is quite busy. We also used ABS boxes so that the data was protected for a long time from any damage.
Geotechnical Monitoring Solutions Offered
The competent team of Encardio-rite assessed the situation on time and came up with an accurate plan of action. Encardio-rite planned the use of monitoring programs and instrumentations to overcome these challenges.
Rite Geosystems Inc, the subsidiary of Encardio-rite in the USA was assigned the task of monitoring the i78 bridge’s real-time movement pattern for both west and east of the bridge abutments. Furthermore, we also provided cloud-based data management solutions.
I-78 Bridge Project Assessment & Details
The results of the inspection conducted on the site revealed the separation in the MSE walls and the i78 bridge. Encardio-rite conducted several more inspections and carried out the project with flying colors ...[Continue reading]
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