Abstract: The traditional method for designing bridge decks in the United States, otherwise known as the Equivalent Strip Method, as presented in the AASHTO LRFD Bridge Design Specifications has been in practice for a considerable amount of time. More recently the Empirical Deck Design has become more accepted and ultimately codified by being incorporated into the 2012 AASHTO LRFD Bridge Design Specifications; however, there is hesitation by many states in the US to actually implement it due, mainly, to the fact that is thought to produce more cracks when compared to the traditional design method. An increase in cracking can lead to an increase in the corrosion of reinforcing steel, and, ultimately, a decrease in expected service life. Epoxy coating is a commonly used corrosion delaying mechanism and has been around for many years. However, more recently stainless reinforcing steel has been considered due to its incredible corrosion resistance. It is postulated that, although stainless steel does have a higher initial cost, when used in conjunction with empirical design, stainless steel may be the most cost-beneficial when evaluating the ownership cost for a bridge deck over the course of the expected service life. This paper describes an investigation of economic viability of using stainless steel in bridge deck design. Results indicate that there is a high likelihood that implementing stainless steel reinforcement following the empirical bridge deck design approach will produce the lower annual costs over traditional AASHTO bridge deck design with epoxy-coated reinforcement while still resulting in a high quality, serviceable bridge deck.
Keywords: Empirical bridge deck design, stainless steel, epoxy-coated reinforcing, life cycle cost analysis.
Title: Economic Viability of Implementing Empirical Bridge Deck Design with Stainless Reinforcing Steel
Author: Meghan Cronin, Brent M. Phares
International Journal of Civil and Structural Engineering Research
ISSN 2348-7607 (Online)
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