Bridge management systems - A review of the state of the art and recommendations for future practice

Generally, bridge principal inspection data fed into Bridge Management Systems is used to prioritise bridge maintenance activities and to prepare associated budgets. However, worldwide, high bridge maintenance costs and inadequate allocation of funds are causing significant backlogs in maintenance activities. Technological solutions that lower manpower requirements, reduce misdiagnosis and lower the cost of bridge maintenance regimes are therefore required to ensure that new and ageing bridges are adequately maintained. A desk review of the state of the art in bridge inspection and bridge management systems used in the United Kingdom, United States of America, Japan, Denmark, Ireland and Southern Africa was undertaken. The bridge inspection regimes reviewed continue to follow the 1976 OECD recommendations. Visual inspections remain the predominant method for carrying out bridge inspections. However, visual inspections suffer from problems of inspector subjectivity, visual acuity and observer fatigue, and technological solutions aimed at improving the reliability of visual bridge inspections have not become routine. This paper recommends that technological solutions that automate certain aspects of the visual principal inspection process, such as using optical and thermal cameras mounted on unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), can be used to improve the reliability of visual inspection data and support bridge inspectors in the arduous task of detecting and recording bridge defects.