ABSTRACT
Seventeen long span bridges including ten suspension bridges, five cable-stayed bridges, one arch bridge, and one truss bridge were designed and constructed between Honshu-island and Shikoku-island in Japan by the Honshu Shikoku Bridge Authority (HSBA). It took about 30 years to design and construct these bridges. They were all designed based on the allowable stress design method. In order to develop cost-effective maintenance strategies for this group of long span bridges, it is necessary to assess their condition by a system reliability-based approach. In this study, the group of seventeen bridges connecting Honshu and Shikoku islands is briefly described and component and system reliability results for the first suspension bridge constructed by HSBA are summarized based on previous studies of the authors. The results indicate an extremely high reliability of main cables and hanger ropes. The question of a possible reduction in the reliability of main cables and/or hanger ropes cannot be separated from the question of system reliability modeling.
