BRIDGES
HOLISTIC APPROACH TO BRIDGE ASSET MANAGEMENT
Tasman Bridge over the Derwent River in Hobart, Tasmania.
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ustralian and New Zealand road managers maintain around 70,000 bridges on public road networks. To assist their work in ensuring bridge assets provide a suitable level of service to the economy and community, Austroads has developed a guideline that applies asset management principles specifically to bridges to address their unique characteristics and needs. Building on foundational documents, such as ISO 55000 and the International Infrastructure Management Manual (IIMM), the guideline promotes an engineering approach. Barry Wright, Lead Advisor Structures, New Zealand Transport Agency and Austroads Project Manager for the guideline, said, “What we found was a heavy apparent reliance on numerical condition ratings. But the project team
considered that this approach had limitations and we needed an engineering-based approach.” Ross Guppy, Austroads Transport Infrastructure Program Manager, said, “Using engineering principles, knowledge, experience and modelling tools is the only robust approach to understanding the current and future condition and needs of a bridge network. “Expert structural engineering skills and experience are required to optimise heavy vehicle access, and to generally manage and operate bridges safely and efficiently.”
Bridge in Genoa, Italy.
Principles of lifecycle activities that inform bridge asset management.
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June 2021 // Issue 19
SIGNIFICANT STAKEHOLDER CONSULTATION UNDERTAKEN The guideline was developed through a national and international literature review and significant stakeholder consultation. Dr Torill Pape represented AECOM during the project development and is now the Director (Structures Design, Review and Standards) at the Department of Transport and Main Roads Queensland. She said, “We knew there were several guidelines and standards in existence for contemporary asset management practices that we could leverage off, but we were ultimately trying to find specific documents to provide a holistic approach related to bridge asset management. www.infrastructuremagazine.com.au
