Response of Highway Bridges to Renewal Traffic Loads

The response of highway bridges under the passage of vehicles is studied. The bridge is idealized as a damped linear system and a special renewal counting process is used to represent the vehicular traffic. The response of the bridge is then considered as a filtered renewal process. A method is developed to obtain, numerically, response quantities such as the probability density function and expected rate of threshold crossings. An example is given to illustrate the use of the method.