STUDIES ON BOW-STRING GIRDER BRIDGES

Abstract

Bow - String Girder Bridges are well known for their aesthetic value and have undergone a gradual change in the material used for its construction to reach its present concrete and steel configuration. In India Bow - String Girder Bridges have been used mainly in the regions where small spans are to be bridged and are mainly for light vehicular traffic. However in the developed world these have been used for multilane of heavy traffic: Though the economical sense of it is not much clear, it is preferred to make an impression on the viewers with its beauty. The need to consider Class-A loading with two lanes is of much importance with the increasing traffic in the modern age. As compared to developed countries labor in India is cheap whereas material and equipment are expensive, and hence it is necessary to do proper design for most economic and safe configuration. Bow - String Girder Bridge involves many parameters over which final output depends. Effect of all these parameters have been considered for the design as project. Bow - String Girder bridges have been safely designed over period of past century using classical theories. On other hand modern finite element based software becoming more popular now a day. The finite element method, while being a powerful analysis tool can easily mislead the inexperienced engineer, it is very easy to have a subtle modeling error which totally invalidates the analysis. Hence it is necessary to analyze and design and have confidence in results produced by the software.